I am taking a anti-convulsant that both my neuro and my pdoc wanted me to try but for 2 different issues, seizures and Bipolar.  It helps that they both wanted the same med.

I also have done, and am still involved in, therapy.  I've been in and out of therapy since I was 12.  I go when it is most crucial and when things seem to settle... I take breaks and some of those breaks can be years long.  Still, I use what I learn in therapy and have learned over the many years to offset and/or manage some (not all) of my symptoms - to cope and learn how to work with them.

I've done the anti-psychotics, both the old and the newer.  I no longer take them, any of them.  My psychosis symptoms are not severe, generally only disturbances, and I tend to just "live with it" rather than be over drugged and zombified and my mind turned to quicksand... which the anti-psychotics have always done to me. 

I have taken Lithium before and it worked for what it needed to work for but it caused  problems.  I would, most certainly, return to taking it if absolutely necessary. 

However, the anti-convulsant I am currently on and the supplements I am taking (suggested by both doctors) are, at minimal, helping... as well as getting rid of one major life stressor and trigger this year. 

I have bad spells, I have very bad episodes still... I just don't sharepost about them any longer (used to) and I try not to just dwell on the Bipolar all the time.  It is a illness and it's chronic. 

I try, and often sometimes fail, to manage it every living day but manage it, I try - every single day.  However, it does not control my every day - it's there but it's in my life, not my life.

I am different than you Kad in that my illness is different.  It affects and effects me differently and what you might be able to tolerate, I can't and vice a versa.  Yet, we share similar and common experiences with the emotions and moods of the illness.  So, my daily management may not necessarily work for others as theirs may not work for mine... still, a treatment management program has to be in place for anyone struggling with this disorder and the individual struggling has to work whatever the program.