Since I'm a psychiatrist maybe I'll put my 2 cents in here. The drugs we call "mood stabilizers" are actually anti-manic drugs. Most of them don't help the depression of bipolar disorder, they simply keep you from having a manic episode. The newest one, Lamictal, is the first to actually help the depressive episodes which are much more common in bipolar. So Lamictal is really the only true 'mood stabilizer'. Anti-psychotics are very good at treating manic episodes too, and generally require less bloodwork with less risk of serious side effects. Europe uses anti-psychotics to treat mania, and I suspect the US will too eventually.

Allow me to get on my soapbox for a moment on bipolar disorder. In the last 5-6 years the diagnosis of bipolar has skyrocketed. I believe this is due to all of the advertising appearing in the psychiatric literature and all the research funded by drug companies when they figured out that their antipsychotics were useful for bipolar instead of just for schizophrenia (and they are). However, 95% of the time when someone comes into my office thinking or having been diagnosed with bipolar disorder they don't have it. Usually they have a personality disorder, frequently borderline personality disorder, and the rapid sudden shifts in mood (day to day, or even hour to hour) are mistaken as bipolar. True bipolar is an illness where a person spends most of their time with a normal or depressed mood and only has a 'manic' episode once or twice a year for several weeks at a time. Most of the people I see who have been misdiagnosed (or mis-self-diagnosed) have unstable moods almost every day. Childhood trauma is almost always found in their histories as well as frequent suicide attempts, stormy interpersonal relationships, phobias of abandonment, etc.

However, despite the misdiagnosis of bipolar, 'mood stabilizers' and antipsychotics are very helpful in these folks. This is because these medications significantly blunt the impulsivity in personality disorders. Violent rages, cutting, spur of the moment indiscretions are dramatically reduced. I routinely use an antidepressant and a low dose newer antipsychotic (usually the smallest dose made or even 1/2 of that) with great success in my borderline patients. In fact in one of my patients with borderline personality disorder and bulimia, a low dose of Abilify dramactically controlled her rage AND her vomiting. I like working with borderline personality disorders, but unfortunately many psychiatrists do not. Some even refuse to see them. Although medication is very useful, it is never enough by itself. Psychotherapy (often for years) is necessary to ease the pain and try and undue the trauma. www.mhsanctuary.com/borderline is a wonderful resource that tells you more about this disorder. Also you should check out www.needymeds.com - this is a one-stop resource that contains information on all the patient assistance programs available to patients for free meds. They explain the program in a straight-forward way, and usually have the applications for the programs you can print off online. Since the antipsychotics can cost over $400 a month, if you can get them for free through the program this is a great deal!