Fear of pain or fear of reopening some surgical wound is probably holding him back from coughing as hard or often as he should. Find someone who can reassure him (Kendall, send a post, please!) that he won't come apart. That it gets easier.

I had a similar problem after some surgery--fear that the trip to the restroom was going to be so painful that I considered letting them reinstall the catheter as they offered. My ex, who had also experienced lower abdominal surgery, came into the room and said "Good Luck" in a way that sounded snotty, so I said so. He said "No, no, I didn't mean it that way. I meant that it won't be as bad as you're afraid of, if you'll just relax." He was right, and I'm glad he took the time to tell me, because I'd have been a lot more uncomfortable with the catheter and possible infection those can bring on. So someone in the know about recovery from this kind of surgery needs to share information with Curmudgeon right now when he really needs it. For whatever reason, at times like this we don't believe the doctors, but we do believe our friends.

SRS