About three weeks ago, I began to continually hear noises from
my lungs as I breath. Coughing could never cleare it.

My doc. says I developed a lung bronchitis and gave some med
(forget the name). I found this infection unusual in that it
never cause an asthma attack. So I never became wheezy or out of
breath. But I constantly had to cough several times per minute
to clear the lungs in order to breath without the noise. The
constant coughing caused my chest and abdominal muscles to get
very sore last week. So sore I could no longer cough without
pain. The infections' cleared up now.

Although I found the coughing both very exhausting and painful,
it did have a positive effect: It seems the very hard constant
coughing I endured was not unlike a good workout at the gym.
I can now do 3X as many sit-ups!
Now I don't recommend we all start coughing to workout those
muscles. Just interesting note on how the body tries to help or
compensate for a challenge.