By endogenous - and it may not be an accepted term - I mean depression not caused by events, stressors, actions I undertook in particular regrets I have after manic periods. My life is ruined and sad feelings about it are a normal reaction, it is what is called situational. It is not like I was happy and my circumstances were stable and good and one day I wake up and the world is grey and I feel worthless - or substitute whatever your symptoms are.

I had tremor at 1000 mg Depakote. I definitely had tremor at 1250 Depakote. I am now trying to see if I can be tremor-free at 500 mg, while still reaping the benefits. On the benefits side, knock on wood, it seems that I am doing just fine, but I will have tremor - perhaps a bit less. We will wait and do a blood test to see where I am at. Tremor is a very bad side effect because it is visible to the world. Depakote gives me groggy mornings sometimes, but they are my private problem, the world is unaware. I went to lunch with someone I knew many years ago, and my hand holding the fork was shaking like crazy. I was very self-conscious and sad. If I cannot get over tremor, I will start telling people that I take this medication for migraines (that is true, the second reason I take Depakote is migraine prevention, for which 500 mg is sufficient dosage) and get tremor from it. Or, let the new p-doc come up with some magic, but I doubt we would want to move away from this combination of Lithium and Depakote because it controls mania so well, plus on Depakote I get an average of 1 migraine attack per week and off Depakote - 4 attacks. That is a difference between annoying and debilitating.