WHAT CAUSES ALCOHOLISM
Several studies on the problems of maturing have cautioned against the use of alcohol by children and young people. These have been based on the accepted thesis that the average person does not fully mature until they are about 25 years of age. Insurance Companies are concerned about the young and immature driver and for this reason the insurance rates are extremely high until the driver becomes 26 years of age. The maturing process revolves around the development of a small but vital organ located in the brain. This organ known as the hypothalamus, is vitally effected by alcoholic beverages be they beer, wine or liquor. The eminent Dr. Jorge Valles, M.D., a psychiatrist extensively involved in therapy work with alcoholics and vitally concerned as to “what causes the alcoholic” points out in his book “From Social Drinking to Alcoholism” that: “The younger the age at which an individual starts to ingest alcohol, the greater the chances that he will develop into a chronic alcoholic. For the action of the alcohol is channeled directly toward the adolescent’s imbalanced hypothalamus and autonomic nervous system, thereby obstructing his emotional maturation on both psychological and physiological levels. The regular or frequent ingestion during adolescence may produce a permanent imbalance of the hypothalamus and a concomitant irreversible malfunctioning of the autonomic nervous system, thereby leading to the development of chronic alcoholism. In brief, the direct action of the alcohol on the hypothalamus produces chronic alcoholism.”
17. HEREDITY
Medical research has shown that alcoholism runs in families. Family histories taken from patients indicate that 95% of the time, the mother or father had a drinking problem, or an uncle or brother. Usually when there is an alcoholic in a family, you will find many more in the background. Heredity studies, done all over the world, clearly show that genetics is the most significant single factor determining whether or not an individual will be an alcoholic. Medical science has found an abnormality in the body chemistry of the predispositioned alcoholic. Discovered in the brain of the chronic alcoholic is a substance that is closely related to heroin. This substance has long been known to scientists as Tetrahydrosoquinoline or THIQ for short. Heroin when shot into the body, breaks down and turns into THIQ. When the “normal” adult drinker takes a drink, it is metabolized at the rate of one drink per hour. The body first converts the alcohol to acetaldehyde which is extemely toxic. If it were to build up one would get violently sick and could die. The body gets rid of acetaldehyde by changing it into acetic acid, and then changes it a couple of more times into carbon dioxide and water which is then eliminated throughout the kidneys and the lungs. When the alcoholic takes a drink something additional happens to the above sequence of events. A very small amount of poisonous acetaldehyde is not eliminated, instead it enters the brain, where, through a very complicated biochemical process, it becomes THIQ. THIQ is manufactured in the brain, and it occurs only in the brain of the alcoholic drinker, it does not happen in the “normal” drinker. THIQ is also highly addictive. During the Second World War THIQ was going to be used as a pain killer but it was found to be more addictive than morphine so the scientists had to abandon the use of it. Once THIQ is in the brain it stays. An alcoholic could be sober for 10 or 25 years and then start drinking again. An example of this is an individual, who is alcoholic, sober for 15 years and 65 years of age, taking Geritol for an iron deficiency. The sober alcoholic innocently taking a prescription, sold over the counter, is consuming an iron supplement that has an alcohol content. The THIQ factor becomes activated and the alcoholic will show the same symptoms displayed years before. The alcoholic says, “I don’t know why I started again. Drinking was the last thing from my mind”. This is the progressiveness of the disease. Families who have a predisposition of alcoholism, an abnormality in the family body chemistry, which is more clearly seen as a predisposition toward making THIQ, have no way of knowing this THIQ making chemistry is inherited. Most “normal” Americans take a drink now and then, and the young alcoholics-to-be want to be normal also. So they take a drink now and then, too. As time goes on the “normal” drinker stays with moderation - the alcoholic’s-to-be brain is building a cache of THIQ and drinking more and more until the “invisible line” is crossed into alcoholism. Predisposed people cross this line while they are teenagers or earlier, some it may occur when they are 30 or 40 or maybe even retired. But once it does happen, the alcoholic will be addicted to alcohol as he would have been addicted to heroin, if he had been shooting that instead, and for very similar chemical reasons. Now its chronic, progressive, incurable nature is obvious to practically everyone who knows the alcoholic. Now it’s all too clearly a disease. “The alcoholic cannot be held responsible for his/her heredity.”