Hi Sue,
Thank you so much for your reply and thank you for being the voluntary monitor for this group to offer help and hope which is very comforting to me.
Last Oct.  I started coughing, especially bad at night. I went to see 4 different  doctors, they could  not identify anything wrong, x-ray showed nothing.  The coughing never  went away and in Feb. this year I got pneumonia. During  pneumonia treatment,  they did a wide range of blood tests and lung function tests. The function test was normal and a CT scan in March showed pneumonia.  But cough mucus never went away, because of all the test results, doctors believe that I was healing slowly from pneumonia. But recently my condition got worse. I was out of breath while walking. And I got so much more mucus. So they did another CT scan.  This time,  it came with the bad news, I had infections in my lungs and mild bronchiectasis. I have not done another test to identify NTM yet. I might need it in the future. As you all know bronchiectasis is not going to kill us right away, but it makes us so susceptible to infections which is scary. I was so happy to  find you, living a normal life with this disease. This means so much to me. I feel like this is a new family I belong to. In this family we help one another, encourage one another and give advice to one another, and give hope to one another. Right now I am still gathering information on how to control my bronchiectasis condition and try to live a normal life as you all do.My pulmonologist asked me to use the albuterol twice a day before I use a mucus device to get mucus out. Reading your posts,  it seems that keeping the airway clean is the key to avoiding  infections, is that right?  It seems you all use Nebulised 7% hypertonic saline. And some people use smartvest. Should I start using them? I read your earlier post, you mentioned finding a bronchiectasis specialist to work with is very important. I think it is a good idea. I found a pulmonologist focusing on bronchiectasis. I will try to get an appointment with him and see what he says. But you live with this disease and know what works and what not.  I truly value your opinions. Please let me know what you think I should do at my stage. I want to live a normal life, a full life like you say.  Many thanks agaiin!
Ling