COPD isn't a death sentence, and you seem to be doing well on your medications. The keys to living well with both COPD and diabetes are daily exercise and weight control through diet and exercise. Talk with your doc about beginning a daily exercise program of at least 30 minutes of aerobic exercise and resistance training of 30 minutes three times a week. You can go to a gym or do the work at home. Reviewing exercises on-line will help you learn correct technique. Take your meds, get your vaccines, stay away from people with bugs and get medical assistance ASAP if you do get something respiratory. With a good exercise and proper weight control you'll do just fine.

More to the point, start learning good information about COPD. This site as good information and you can find excellent resources at www.copdfoundation.org. You information about metformin is one-sided; there is increasing evidence that people who take metformin breathe better. The Foundation anticipates starting a clinical trial on this subject soon. Accurate information is important to increasing your ability to manage and control your COPD. As for life expectancy, I've lived with COPD (my FEV1 hovers in the mid-30s, just like yours) for 35 years and plan for another 10 or so, at least. No one comes with an "expires by" date stamped anywhere, so how long you live depends almost solely on you, how you live and what you do for yourself and plain luck.

Calm down, start exercising and learn about COPD; you have choices and things you can do to make things a lot better for yourself. Get started.

Welcome! You have come to the right place for support and guidance. First and foremost, COPD is not a death sentence. You can't reverse your condition but with proper exercise, diet and meds you can stabilize the disease from getting worse.
Rehabilitation, if your doctor hasn't suggested it, is extremely useful and will provide you with tools and necessary exercises, including proper breathing techniques.
Take the time to read the various articles and websites on this site and ensure you have the proper medical team behind you, especially a pulmonologist.
People here will with any questions and concerns and more importantly support and make you smile. I will let others pipe in but will be back with additional info. Take care, breathe easy!

Thanks Jean, while my breathing can't be considered anything near normal as I can suffer SOB very easily a lot of it seems to be related to how much and how often I eat, I really need to space out my meals quite a lot and keep them quite minimal. Tonight for example which is a carb night for me was 1/2 a roast chicken breast, 180gms of mashed potatoes ( no butter or salt, just pepper ) and two Broccoli florrets, if I eat any more than that I feel gassy and bloated and it causes problems with breathing. It's 28 days after my intitial referral to the Better Breathing clinic and I had not heard anything so I emailed them myself, they have no record of me even being referred to go on the waiting list so being pro active I have them chasing up my doctors surgery for the referral. I can not believe how slack my doctor has been. The other problem I had with Metformin which may be unrealated is that after sorting out my diabetes initially I seemed to suffer an allergic reaction with it having cause constant pure liquid motions. I have recently started taking metformin again 1/4 of a tablet ( sealing the rest in an airtight moisture proof container ) with each meal, it does appear to be helping with my blood sugar levels but if I attempt to go up to 1/2 a tablet 3 times a day with meals I get back to the same issue. And an upset stomache definately upsets the breathing. I watched a video here on proper pursed lipped breathing method and I was doing it wrong, I am now doing it right... BUT... if I get SOB am I supposed to keep going using pursed lipped breathing or stop and do pursed lipped breathing until I feel better and then carry on?