Lithium is still the benchmark for treatment of bipolar illness, although I much preferred Lamictal and took a very small dosage (about 15 mg) for a year.

How well you get along is going to depend to a large degree on how much you are
pro-active in your care. It certainly seems as though you intend to be.

I would say that the best things I did to help myself were to do the following:

1. Give up tea, coffee, and anything else containing caffeine or theophylline.
(For those sensitive to it, it makes the illness worse.)

2. Give up alcohol-it makes bipolar illness worse.

3. Changed my diet to eliminate breads (because of the damage exorphins do to
us--and it is contained in gluten--so anything containing gluten might be considered off limits if we're sensitive to it. (It can cause many, many problems.)

4. Added Omega 3 fatty acids to my diet. They are wonderful for me for calming feeling tone and creating a quiet atmosphere. (Lemon juice will do the same thing for some of us. Just squeeze two lemongs in about 8 oz of water and drink it. If you aren't better after 4 hours, repeat the process. That usually works for those of us who use it.)

5. Read some sights online such as http://www.Alkalinefoods.com for insight into
which foods are best to help keep the fluids and tissues of the body in a more alkaline state.

You need to know that all medications leave an acidic ash (or residue) that must be
metabolized. When we take meds every 24 hours, it is sometimes difficult for the kidneys to keep the blood clear of the effects of that residue. That's the primary
reason for altering the diet: to reduce strongly the acidic reaction of medications and foods which are naturally digested as acidic.

It may sound strange that the lemon (which tastes very bitter) is actually
transformed in digestion into one of the most alkaline foods we can ingest; it's
very helpful for tissues and fluids in improving feeling tone.

Good wishes on going pro-active. It will help, I think.