@ldepauw715 Hello and welcome to Mayo Connect and to the MAC support group. All of us feel scared and overwhelmed by our diagnosis at first, especially if we use "Dr. Google" to try to learn about an infection we probably never heard of before. In your case, with a bad history with long-term antibiotics, you have even more reason to be concerned.

But, antibiotic treatment is not an absolute for people with a MAC infection. Depending on severity, and their other health conditions, some people elect to take a "watch and wait" approach. This does not mean you do nothing - it means to undertake a period of healthy living and a routine of daily airway clearance, where you use a saline in a nebulizer to add moisture to the lungs, then practice a number of breathing techniques to try to move the mucus and infectious material out of your lungs.

You mentioned being a long-time smoker. Have you also been diagnosed with COPD, emphysema, asthma, chronic bronchitis or bronchiectasis? If so, you need a pulmonologist experienced in treating your specific condition. Especially bronchiectasis and MAC are very rare, and if the doctors are not familiar with the latest protocols, they tend to jump straight to the standard antibiotics. Did you bring up your bad history with antibiotics to the pulmonologist?