Last Sunday's New York Times magazine "Diagnosis" column featured the story of a surprising diagnosis of a troubled young man by Culver City physician Dr. Jory Goodman. 

In the story, the 23-year-old's parents reach the end of their rope when his behavior becomes out-of-control:

He stopped eating and sleeping. He spent one night destroying his bedroom, throwing everything — books, computer, CDs, furniture, pictures — into the center of the floor.

The next day he started running a crazy circuit in the house and outside. In the front door, through the house, then out the back. He ran for hours, bumping and sliding against doorways, walls and furniture.

His mother tried to stop him — she grabbed at him, trying to slow him down — but each time he shook her off roughly and kept going. Sick with worry, she did something she’d never done before: She called the sheriff.

This incident leads the boy and his parents to Alta Hollywood Hospitals -- now called Southern California Hospital -- in Culver City to see Dr. Jory Goodman. Despite the boy's long history of diagnosis as a manic depressive, Goodman believes he has a better idea what's wrong: porphyria, a rare genetic disease that develops in patients born without the ability to make certain essential body chemicals including heme, an important component of hemoglobin. Spoiler alert: he's right!

Read the whole fascinating story HERE.