Sacramento Bee

January 5, 2008

Passages: Boy's best friend

Special moments through the eyes of children

By Jocelyn Wiener

Evan Moulton climbed onto Thunder's back and giggled. He lay down, put his head on Thunder's belly, and giggled. He let Thunder wrestle with him and dance with him and shake his hand, and every time, he giggled.

There's a reason the Moulton family calls their golden retriever "Thunder, the Wonder Dog."

Nine-year-old Evan never used to smile.

In fact, for a number of years, he only screamed – a bloodcurdling shriek that lasted for hours.

A few days after he was born, Evan's parents – Linda and Ray – noticed something seemed different about their little boy.

Unlike his four older siblings, he refused to nurse. To soothe the baby's crying fits, Ray wrapped him tightly in his arms and did knee bends for hours.

By the time Evan turned 1, his parents had heard the word "autism." By 2 he was enrolled in ALTA Regional Center's Early Intervention program; behaviorists and occupational therapists came to the house to help the Moultons learn to care for Evan.

But soon after his second birthday, Evan stopped speaking. He refused to wear any clothing except a pair of socks on his arms. He sat and slept in a leather chair. He wouldn't eat and drank only 7-Up, served in a bottle with three ice cubes lined up vertically. His parents tried to sneak in water, but if the drink was too diluted, he refused it.

Some days, the Moultons didn't have time to shower or eat.

"Life," Linda says, "came to a screeching halt."

She read everything she could. When therapists visited, she implored: "Teach me everything."

She learned that some children with autism are not wired to absorb information the way other people do. As a result, they can go into sensory overload. A five-minute trip to the grocery store would leave Evan overwhelmed for three days.

Linda, Ray and their older sons learned that Evan needed repetition and consistency. Occupational therapists taught them to use pressure and sensory stimulation to calm him. For six or seven hours a day, they brushed Evan's arms and applied pressure to his joints. They sandwiched him between large pillows, and squeezed him tight.

While behavioral and educational work are the primary methods for treating autism, Dr. Robert Hendren, a psychiatry professor at UC Davis' MIND Institute, says the occupational therapy Evan's family used can also prove helpful for some children.

Indeed, after a few years, Evan showed some signs of improving.

His mother home-schooled him and took him out for a gymnastics class. He spoke in front of his church.

He attended a social skills group, where he spent the whole time petting the teacher's golden retriever. He started therapeutic horseback riding, brushing the horses' manes with his fingers, picking their hooves, even – reluctantly – cleaning up after them.

Evan related well to animals. Unlike people, he found them simple, easy to understand.

The Moultons decided Evan would benefit from a service dog. But getting one proved difficult – one organization wanted Evan to come stay for three weeks of training before they gave him a dog. For a boy who rarely left home, that felt impossible.

Then, one day, Linda Moulton opened the PennySaver.

She saw an advertisement for a 5-month-old golden retriever. Thunder's owners let Linda take the dog to a trainer to see whether he could be trained to work with a 7-year-old with autism.

"This is a fabulous dog," the trainer told her. "Go get him."

One day, as Evan recalls it, his parents walked in and said, "We have a surprise for you."

They steered him to the door, where Thunder was waiting.

In the two years since, Thunder has slept in Evan's bed. He's learned to push heavily on Evan's 50-pound frame, providing the physical pressure that soothes him. When they head out in public, Evan finds it easier to talk to people if conversations focus on his dog. In an overwhelming world, Thunder serves as Evan's anchor.

"He's like the only friend that I'm consistently with, and he's the only thing that can distract me from video games, and he's also a very nice dog," Evan said the other afternoon.

Linda Moulton calls Thunder "a hundred pounds of happy."

Evan has other obsessions. When he talks about Pokemon and Legos and dinosaurs, he sounds like any other ultra- informed 9-year-old boy.

"People say dinosaurs are completely and totally extinct, but actually every bird alive today is a dinosaur because dinosaurs evolved into birds," Evan explained, as he turned on the movie "Prehistoric Planet," which his mother says he's watched about 20,000 times.

"Everybody gets a little bit tired of it," she said.

"Not everybody," Evan corrected.

From time to time, Evan's attention inevitably wandered back to Thunder. They bounded around the house, wrestling and dancing, giggling (in Evan's case), panting (in Thunder's).

Sometimes, Evan confides in Linda: Mom, I don't want to have autism. I want to be a regular kid.

You are a regular kid, she replies, you're just a regular kid who has autism.

Watching her youngest son and his dog, she couldn't help but giggle herself.

"Two happy boys," she said.

About the writer: "Passages" is a Metro feature that looks at special moments in the lives of kids, from first haircuts to first prom dresses. If you know of such an event coming up, please contact Jocelyn Wiener at jwiener@sacbee.com or call (916) 321-1967.