Lost Account

We replaced my husband's phone (actually twice) and have yet been able to recover his account. I found out after the second replacement that we didn't sign out of the original iPhone. The problem is we can never sign out of that phone because it was thrown away. It had a severely cracked screen and died. The first iPhone replacement was never connected to his own Apple account because I couldn't figure out how to do it. I didn't find out until last night that he needed to sign out of his old iPhone (the original one) before he can recover his account. The signing out thing was new to me. Apple support was of no help. In case you wondering, account recovery is a circular thing. Every time you put your id in and don't know your password, it tells you to wait 12 days before you can recover your account. This happens every time and you are never given a chance to change the password, despite putting in your birthdate, your phone number, etc. Has anyone else had this problem where you absolutely can't sign out of the old phone because it no longer exists? How does he recover his account?