Treatment

Question:  My 21-year-old son is normally a quiet and friendly person who has never been in any trouble. Until this past year, he did not drink any alcohol, but when he started to drink he got into trouble every time. Even though he and his friends tell me that he only has one or two drinks, my son becomes violent, gets into fights, and really scares people. He says he won’t drink again because two weeks ago it took police to control him. Is alcohol the cause of this change in behavior?

 Your son probably has a relatively rare condition known as pathological intoxication, whereby alcohol acts paradoxically in that it excites rather than sedates. Ordinarily, people affected by this disorder exhibit marked aggressiveness with assaultive and destructive behavior after drinking only a small amount of alcohol. Hostility, rage and violent outbursts towards others, with no memory of what happened, are also consistent with the diagnosis of pathological intoxication. The only treatment is absolute abstinence from alcohol.

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