@haiku444, Good morning. I see that you are new to our site. Welcome to our group. It is a pain in the neck to cough so much; I did it for nearly 10 yrs. Went on tobramycin and got rid of it in 2016. There are other treatment options besides the 'Big 3'. My dr at Mayo doesn't use that method to treat mac. He said it is over-kill and that 18 months isn't long enough to kill out the mac completely. He uses alternating monthly single antibiotics for years. It took me a yr to knock out mac in 2013, but stayed on the meds for two more yrs to keep it away. Then caught pseudomonas in 2016 and started a diff med regimen. Knocked out the pseudo in 30 days, but continued the meds up to the present to keep it away. If you saw me 11 yrs ago, you would not believe that I was the same person that you see today. Girl.....I was SO sick. I was so out of breath that I could not walk 10 feet without sitting down, I coughed literally non-stop 24\7. That cough caused me to pull just about every muscle in my torso, stressed my bladder, stopped me from going to movies, restaurants, the mall, etc. Today, I breathe clearly, never cough, can walk big blocks at a time and ride my bicycle endlessly. I have permanent damage in my lungs that cause me some shortness of breath, but, overall; my quality of life has improved greatly. I believe we can all get there with the right treatment. Many people freak out when they get diagnosed with MAC; so I am glad that you posted that you have been living with it for 20 yrs. I know when I had it, I thought I would be dead in 2 yrs. I went out and had my Living Trust set up, (which we should all do anyway).