A mother who contracted pneumonia at 14 that led to life-threatening sepsis, a collapsed lung, and a two-week induced coma said the lasting damage has meant she now suffers up to a dozen infections per year.
Claire Smith, 38, a midwife from Dudley in the West Midlands, said this frequency of infections is down to her diagnosis a “couple of months later” of bronchiectasis – a long-term condition where the airways in the lungs become damaged which can cause built-up phlegm that makes it easier for bacteria to get trapped in the airways, according to the charity Asthma + Lung.
Her breathing condition means Claire now has only 50% lung function and while she initially struggled with simple exercise such as walking up stairs or playing football, she said getting into weightlifting in her early 30s and then running at 36 gave her “more confidence” with fitness.
Since then, she has completed a 50km trek across the Sahara desert in October last year and the TCS London Marathon in April, tackling the latter in memory of her mother, Margaret O’Sullivan, who died in May 2025 at 68 after her own diagnosis of bronchiectasis, as well as emphysema – a type of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) characterised by damage to the air sacs in the lungs.
Claire told PA Real Life: “If I’d let this defeat me, my lungs could be in a very different way right now and I probably wouldn’t be the active mum that I am.
“I want to have a good future with my children and I want to run around with my grandchildren.
“I think everybody deserves that.”
Claire said her pneumonia at 14 started with “flu-like symptoms” that carried on for a week, so she was prescribed a week-long course of antibiotics.
Despite this medication, Claire said she “progressively felt worse” and was “really lethargic” as well as being “in and out of consciousness”.
On the day of her hospitalisation during the February school holidays in 2002, she was staying with her father and step-mother but they were both at work.
Claire said: “My step-mum called me up just to check in on me because she knew that I wasn’t feeling too well… but I was delirious on the phone.
“So she called the ambulance from where she was and then rushed home.
“I only really remember the paramedics coming in and carrying me down the stairs.
“I remember getting into New Cross Hospital in Wolverhampton and there was lots of stuff over me.
“Then the next thing I know, I went to sleep.”
Claire was placed in an induced coma after doctors discovered she had life-threatening sepsis and her right lung had collapsed. She needed to be placed on a ventilator.
She added: “They prepared my parents (for the worst) a few times while I was in a coma because there were two different bacterial infections that overwhelmed my body and my organs were shutting down.”
When Claire eventually awoke, her mother Margaret was by her bedside – someone Claire said has been a constant source of support for her ever since.
In the immediate aftermath of her coma, Claire said she had “pressure sores and muscle wastage” so she needed the help of a physiotherapist to walk again.
She stayed in hospital for a month before she was allowed home and spent six months being home-schooled.
Within that time, follow-up tests revealed her chronic diagnosis of bronchiectasis which would need to be managed by a combination of antibiotics and steroids for a total of two months to help reduce inflammation.
Claire said: “Being young, you take things on the chin more, so you’re more resilient.”
Claire said she experienced side effects from the steroids, including nausea, tiredness, and swelling, making her look “moon-faced”.
Ever since, Claire said she struggled to exercise and she was deemed “high-risk” so had to be closely monitored during her first pregnancy at 20 with her son, Tyler, now 17.
After only a few infections throughout her first pregnancy, Claire was deemed low-risk for her subsequent children, Kian, 11, and Freya, six.
For the last 24 years since her diagnosis, she has experienced near-constant chest infections and needed regular monitoring from medical professionals.
Claire said: “Last year, I had 11 courses of antibiotics and I had to send off around nine different mucus samples.
“It’s just about catching it quickly, which I think I’ve got better at doing the older I’ve got, because I know how I feel a lot quicker than I used to.”
Claire initially trained as a nurse before she became a midwife, and she said that “finding out a lot more about the body and healthcare” made her look into her condition “a little bit more”.
As a result, she felt comfortable pushing through her reluctance to exercise because of her fear of breathlessness, and started weightlifting in her early 30s, progressing to running by her mid-30s.
During this period, her mother Margaret was diagnosed with emphysema in March 2023 – a COPD condition where nine out of 10 people have a history of smoking, according to Asthma + Lung – yet Margaret had never smoked. She was later diagnosed with the same condition Claire has, bronchiectasis, in March 2024.
Claire said: “There was never really a conversation with us about how serious mum’s condition was and that’s a really upsetting factor to it.
“You’re holding on to hope, but you also need to be there to prepare them for what might happen.”
Around December 2024, doctors diagnosed Margaret with a rare form of interstitial lung disease (ILD) – a term for a group of conditions that cause inflammation and scarring in the lungs.
Before Margaret died in May 2025, Claire promised her mother she would run the London Marathon in her memory, but it was not until after she died that she set about undertaking the challenge.
With a lot of training – including a 50km trek across the Sahara in October last year – Claire completed her first marathon alongside her husband Matthew, both with pictures of Margaret on the backs of their running tops.
Claire said: “She’s had my back all the way and she’s always been my biggest supporter, so I had to have her with me.”
For more information about Asthma + Lung, visit their website here: https://www.asthmaandlung.org.uk/