Hugged hard and lifted off feet. crunch sound in ribs. instant pain- esp. when breath deep cough etc. 48 hrs later moved wrong way- crunched again in same spot- pain much worse! xrays -no breaks. what was the crunching sound in ribs if not broken?

There could have been painful compression of the cartilage that connects the front of the ribs to the sternum, called the costal cartilage. Cartilage is very sensitive and be quite painful when inflamed. A current example is of NFL running back Derrell Henderson of the LA Rams having a rib cartilage injury. It’s been described as a pain tolerance issue. Cartilage will need time to heal.