I feel your pain in dealing with the system that I heard (in Canada) is very hard to work your way through. But I encourage you to keep trying. I want to comment on your use of language:

"There are a LOT of options that are available" - they are not "available", they are "allegedly available". Two very different things.

"And I don't like not having control over my own care" - no one likes it, but if you buy expensive supplements on your own at a natural health food stores, most of them unstudied and potentially dangerous, you are not adding any measure of control. If you read a book, select a supplement and buy it yourself and take it, it may look like superficial control but it isn't.

Sometimes language tricks us, and the word "natural" is notorious for it.

To the point of specific supplements. Melatonin indeed is natural, is well-established through multiple studies and safe and effective, and importantly cannot do you any harm. Valerian has been used for so long that it is probably harmless, but it is also not potent enough for the kind of issues that you deal with in bipolar. I tried it without help. It did nothing, but was probably completely harmless. I have not tried anything else - and will not, either.

This is strongly worded, but I mean it strongly - mean it to discourage from falling prey to the "natural" movement.

And come to think of it, one of the very basic and most natural things is Lithium - just a salt of element number 3.

So if you insist on "natural", you should stick to Lithium.

Moreover, Lithium is naturally occuring in municipal water in some areas, and the rate of suicide is lower in those areas compared to the rest of the world. So by switching from Lithium to some supplement you are not going to go any more "natural" - have you heard of Kava Kava naturally occuring in water in discernible quantities? The fact that Lithium salt is sold by prescription and Kava Kava is not does not make Kava Kava any more superior on the axis of "naturalness"

I hope you find relief in the Canadian system. I feel for you very much. I feel that you are very much in main and very frustrated and I hope that you will find my argument convincing and direct your money and energy at finding a solution that works for you.