Childhood Apraxia of Speech: A Whole-Child Healing Story with Tori Starling

Guest: Tori Starling of Simply Holistic Solutions

The Livin’Sky Podcast, Season 3 Episode 8

From Eczema to Apraxia to Healing: A Mother’s Intuition at Work with Tori Starling

Childhood apraxia of speech is often treated as a motor planning disorder, but for many families, that explanation doesn’t tell the full story. In this episode of The Livin’ Sky Podcast, I sit down with holistic health practitioner and mom Tori Starling to explore her son’s journey through apraxia and the whole-child, root-cause supports that helped him heal.

When a child struggles with speech, feeding, or sensory challenges, parents are often told to focus on one thing at a time: speech therapy for speech, creams for eczema, antibiotics for ear infections, behavior strategies for feeding.

But what if these challenges aren’t separate at all?

SPOTIFY | A PPLE

A Mother’s Intuition Sparks a New Path

Tori’s journey began when her son was just three months old and developed severe eczema. By nine months, he reacted to food. By one year old, he suffered from repeated ear infections and worsening asthma. Multiple rounds of antibiotics followed yet nothing truly helped.

Instead, symptoms stacked.

Doctors escalated treatments, including steroid creams with black box warnings and recommendations that felt deeply wrong to Tori as a mother. Something in her gut told her there had to be another way.

That intuition changed everything.

The Body as a Connected System

When Tori turned to a naturopath, simple but powerful shifts made a difference: removing trigger foods, supporting the gut, and addressing nutritional deficiencies. Asthma disappeared. Ear infections stopped. Eczema improved.

But when her son turned three and wasn’t speaking, she received a diagnosis of childhood apraxia of speech.

Despite consistent speech therapy, progress was minimal and sometimes reversed. That’s when Tori learned about total load: the idea that a child’s ability to learn and speak depends on how much their body is carrying beneath the surface.

Speech therapy was addressing the output but not the system producing it.

A Whole-Child View of Childhood Apraxia of Speech

With integrative testing, Tori discovered her son had multiple nutritional deficiencies, gluten and dairy sensitivity, and signs of mitochondrial stress. His support plan expanded to include:

Targeted nutritional supplementation
Gut health support
Clean, protein-rich diet with healthy fats
Acupuncture and energetic support
A speech therapist aligned with hand cues and whole-body learning

Within one month, his demeanor changed.

Within three months, speech improved significantly.

Within one year, he tested out of apraxia entirely.

Healing Didn’t Stop There

Over time, Tori continued supporting her son’s sensitive system, eventually helping him heal from multiple food allergies through a combination of gut support and energy medicine.

Today, he is a thriving teenager with no learning, behavior, or speech challenges, simply a body that still benefits from mindful support.

Bioenergetics: Supporting the Body Gently

Tori now integrates bioenergetics, a form of energy medicine that looks at the frequencies driving biological processes. Instead of forcing change, this approach supports regulation, nervous system balance, and gentle correction especially important for sensitive children.

Using non-invasive tools like voice or hand scanning, families can receive insights without blood draws or overwhelming protocols. For many parents, this brings relief and empowerment rather than stress.

What This Means for Parents

This conversation reinforces a truth I see daily in my work with picky eaters and neurodivergent children:

Children aren’t refusing, regressing, or “failing” therapy, their bodies are communicating.

When we zoom out and support the whole child gut, nervous system, nutrition, environment, and energy therapy becomes more effective, not less.

A Hopeful Message Moving Forward

If your child’s progress feels slow or stagnant, it doesn’t mean you’ve failed. It may simply mean something deeper is asking for attention.

As Tori beautifully shared, healing doesn’t require perfection it requires listening.

And often, the most powerful starting point is returning to nature’s original blueprint: real food, clean water, sunlight, rest, and safety.

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