To me, the sticky point here is "fully functioning" because most "normal" people aren't! Fully functioning, for what purpose? Survival? A successful high-powered career? Those are pretty different levels of functioning!

I cannot function "normally" or "fully" without meds. And that's not even thinking about the bipolar, that's just the ADHD - I'm annoying to myself and others without the stimulants. When I'm off meds, my work suffers so much it's incredibly distressing.

I don't think I'd have made it out of my teen years without psychoactive meds, so I think that's also a "no" for me in terms of managing bipolar without meds. I probably could survive, but I wouldn't be functioning very well at all. The meds do seem to be helping at this point.