I woke up in the middle of the night (3am) and needed to cough badly. I called my mama in to help me suppress the cough but my chest was spasming (is that how you spell it?) so much she said I just had to have one proper cough. I coughed. And that lead to two additional coughs.

Never in my life have I been in so much PAIN! I actually started crying and holding my belly it was so painful! It took about 20 minutes to calm down and get back into bed. I can't take deep breaths at the moment but I feel better lying down.. Should I see the doctor in the morning?

I'm sure you're fine.

Believe it or not, coughing is good and necessary after surgery. You have to get that gunk up or you risk post operative pneumonia.

My best advice is to keep a pillow handy so next time you cough, you can hug the pillow tight against your tummy so it won't pull and hurt so much.

Best wishes

I coughed in the hospital- and yes it hurts, as does sneezing. The first case of the hiccups I had were horrible. Trust me as you heal it won't hurt when you cough.

Post-op I had a spirometer that I had to breath into to make sure I didn't develop pneumonia.

When was your surgery? If you're really close to your surgery date you may want to call your dr, if you don't have a followup soon.

Just to add to Missy's post which is 100% right a nice hard pillow will help you as you cough and you MUST cough and take those deep breaths even if they make you cough lots and lots.

If you don't get the Fluid up and out of your lungs you will end up back in the hospital and sick with post op pneumonia and that's not going to be fun.

Try drinking something warm as well to loosen things up before you start taking those deep breaths. The steam will help as well.

Good luck and feel better soon!!

Thanks for this information! I just had my surgery yesterday and it seems like I'm coughing every few minutes. They did give me a spirometer to breathe into, and I've been trying to do that (although probably not as much as I should). The hot fluids do seem to be helping as well.