JudeLauren,

Yes, please! . . . a dress rehearsal so we know what is coming next. I got dx'd in 1988 the first time I saw a psychiatrist. I presented depressed. Still she talked about bipolar, lithium, and sent me for thyroid blood work before she could put me on the lithium. That was in 1988.
I'm still changing my mind (refining my outlook if you will) about how I think about this and how I want things to go.

The number of meds a person is on might not matter. Sometimes with mood stabilizers, pdocs put people on two (or even three occasionally) mood stabilzers at low dose in order to get the most benefit with least side effects.

Some mdoc meds cause depression (blood pressure meds and so on). The pdocs usually (but not always) take that into consideration when they create the combo.
(I'm into my parentheses tonight ).

Actually, I think of this as a dance. Sometimes the bipolar leads and we follow. Sometimes we have a hard time keeping up. Sometimes we break dance. I try to follow.

M