Update - I just sneezed again. My god, the pain…it lingered intensely for a good 30 seconds after the sneeze (not even mentioning the white-hot pain from the sneeze itself).
Good times… 
Can’t decide whether this thread makes me feel better about my broken clavicle.
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Oh man … just saw this thread. So sorry to hear about your rib … so painful.
Sneezing with a broken rib is absolutely the worst pain I’ve ever felt … here are a few tips that helped me:
— Take a Claritin the minute you wake up, even if you’re not prone to allergies (and it’s the season in Chicago) take one, it will dry you up and help prevent it. Or a Sudafed.
— Carry a tissue in your hand/pocket at all times … if you feel a sneeze coming on, jam the tissue up your nose the minute you feel it … kind of how you would if you had a bloody nose. This helped me stop the sneeze.
— Lastly, for some reason I found that Advil did nothing for my pain from a broken/cracked rib and/or cartilage (I’ve done it twice). Try taking Aleve, it always helped me much more than Advil and aided in recovery. Not sure why, but it made a big difference.
As a doctor once said to me when I asked how to help it heal faster: “Well the problem with a broken rib is that every time you breathe you re-injure it, so the only way to really help is to stop breathing.” 
Good luck. Lots of crashing going around the Midwest this year … heal fast.
#neversneeze
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Yeah, unfortunately I am on blood thinners, so any NSAID is off the option list for me…only Tylenol. But I’m not taking that even that much anymore…just kinda gutting it out after gobbling them like Pez for about 5 days. Figured I’d give my stomach a break.
My daughter said today that if you say “banana” when you feel a sneeze coming on, it stops it…sounds like BS to me, but I also felt acupuncture was basically voodoo and here I am 2 appts later, significantly better, so…
I’ll definitely give “banana” a try next time I have to sneeze. 
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You can train yourself to stifle sneezes. But of course, it’s not practical to try to do that when you have broken ribs.
The old trick of pressing hard against the cartilage just below your nose (between your upper lip and your nose) definitely works. Something about the pain causes your body to forget about the sneeze.
When I had broken ribs, I awoke in the middle of the night (in the hospital) nauseous, and started dry-heaving. That was terribly painful. It was at that point that I resolved to never again take medication on an empty stomach. Always take pills with some solid food to hopefully avoid nausea while your ribs are broken.
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