Alex Evans of Stirchley finds exercise helps his lung disease

Feb 23 2010 by Diane Parkes, Birmingham Mail

Sleepless nights and endless coughing used to leave Alex Evans feeling depressed every morning. Here Alex, aged 28, from Stirchley, tells DIANE PARKES how he has turned his life around.

Every day I would wake up and find it hard to breathe. I would cough a lot and it was very painful.

I had a build up of mucus in the airways which would take two or three hours to clear.

I was having difficulty sleeping due to the coughing.

I had very little energy and got out of breath very quickly after walking even the shortest of distances.

Last year I was diagnosed with a rare lung disease called bronchiectasis.

I had been a smoker when I was younger and that can make it worse, but I also had a lot of problems with ear and chest infections when I was a kid. Doctors said that can cause bronchiectasis in later life.

It cannot be cured but it can be managed by antibiotics and by physiotherapy, leaning forward and tapping the chest in the morning.

But I knew this had to change. I couldn’t go on feeling like the hare trapped inside a tortoise’s body, it was depressing.

A friend recommended I go to Fitness First in Stirchley and when I went there they recommended I have a meeting with the personal trainer, Cooper Cunningham.

He wasn’t at all what you would expect from a personal trainer. He wasn’t interested in money or how many appointments he could get out of me, he really wanted to help me.

Cooper said a lot of people go to the gym to bulk up with weights but that wouldn’t be any good for me. What I needed was to increase my breathing capacity and lung capacity. He recommended a lot of cardiovascular exercise so I have been on the running machines, cycling and on the rowing machines. Cooper also said I needed fresh air so he wrote one outdoor activity into the programme once a week.

I have done basketball or go walking in the Malvern Hills. I also make sure I use the steam room at the gym as Cooper said steam inhalation would help to clear the airways.

I started going to the gym last summer and after just two to three months I realised that the mornings were getting easier for me. I wasn’t coughing so much in the morning and I wasn’t having such a build up of mucus.

I can’t praise Cooper enough. He is so full of life and is so motivating. Each week he would check on me asking how I was doing, asking about work, offering advice and motivating me to train that little bit harder.

He showed me how cardiovascular exercise and some light weights training could be even more effective than antibiotics which were causing some undesirable side affects such as nausea and drowsiness.  

The problem is still there, it won’t go away and I have to be careful managing the condition. But it has definitely improved a lot.

I went to my GP recently and he got me to breathe into a machine which tells your lung capacity. My GP said my lung capacity was actually above average and my lungs are very strong which I am sure is down to all the cardiovascular fitness I have been doing.

I am now going to the gym three or four times a week and doing about an hour at a time. You can’t do all that exercise without it affecting you in other ways and I feel my fitness has really improved.

Nearly 12 months on and I feel like a different person. My fitness has improved no end and the shortness of breath has rapidly reduced. Even the coughing has stopped.

I will always have a few issues in the mornings but life has taken a turn in the right direction.