Alcohol intolerance?

Alcohol and I have a very strange relationship.

Every single fucking time I drink, there’ll be an hour of absolute hell where my stomach hurts, almost like I’ve been punched right in the gut. Sometimes I could describe it as the same feeling you get in your feet when you land from a height funny – all bruising and tingly. During this hour I am incapacitated and tend to just die on the fucking floor, if possible. Sometimes my legs start to ache too. Once it’s over, I can get right back to drinking and it won’t happen again. Doesn’t really matter how I pace myself, what I eat, or what specifically I drink, it always happens. I’ve never let it stop me from having a good time, so once that pain goes away I’ll start sinking them like it never even happened. Mind you, I always wake up the next day feeling great. No matter how much I drink.

I don’t drink that often, though, because of this pain. Enduring that one hour is very grim.

But, a month or so ago, I was out drinking cocktails with a few friends. The stomach pain was accompanied by an ache so deep and painful in my shoulders that I went into the bathroom and felt like I was dying for nearly two hours (I work at this place, so I just went and died in the staff bathroom). About an hour into this misery, my lips went numb and started tingling. It eventually all just faded away like nothing was ever wrong.

I was drinking again last night, and not even halfway through my drink the hour of hell began. As soon as it went away I continued drinking, and not long later, it happened again. The tingling lips as well this time.

You’d think I’d take it as a sign not to keep drinking at this point… but I find it so fucking ironic that I can’t seem to stomach alcohol, when my entire bloodline consists of heavy alcoholism. What the hell is going on? Has anyone else experienced these symptoms before?