I take lithium too and am so incredibly conflicted about it.
While my life is markedly more stable, I'm still not happy about taking it. I find myself feeling incredibly flat. Reading(one of my favorite things) is harder. I find myself going over the same paragraphs again and again to absorb them. I definitely feel dumber, searching for words and memories in the middle of speaking.I get nauseous all the time. I'm not on a particularly high dose either. I take 900mg. After my last horrible suicidal depression and flip into wacky nutty mania, we upped it to 1200. That was PURE HELL. I could barely even function, and my face immediately covered itself in acne. Mustering anything to say was impossible. I had to go back down to 900 and up my lamictal to bridge the gap.
I keep taking mini vacations from the lithium. Like five days at a time. I shouldn't do it, and I'm trying VERY hard not to. I'm two weeks strong with no breaks. That sounds silly,but it's an accomplishment. Obviously, I'm having a hard time with it.
The up side, much like you,people in my life have noticed a big difference. Also I'm not regularly ruining my life(mania) or hating it (depression).
I hope it is a miracle drug for you. These drugs effect us all differently. Stability is the important thing.

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