Hyper sensitive to being unwell, is this common?

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Wouldn't you know it, my daughter has been going to disability employment agency for 16 months every fortnight. A business said yes for my daughter to have a work experience for a month of 3 days a week of 3 hours each time. She starts tomorrow afternoon (mon) and she has strained a neck muscle and its her first pain of this kind. She is overcompensating by not moving that area at all. She didn't move all night. She had a panic attack last night, because she was unsure of how to get into bed. She took her prescribed as need ativan, and I breathed with her, out breath longer than in breath, she had been shaking.
I think because of her 'c' posture on her bed over her iPad and role modelling life with her barbie dolls has caused muscle tension. I sat there last night waiting for her to fall asleep. I hadn't needed to do this since she was a child or when she is unwell.
I'm not sure if she is panicking just because of trying to avoid pain and not knowing how to avoid it or is worried more might be wrong. I have reassured her that lots of people have next strain and it will take at least 2 or 3 days to be better. wheat pack, anti inflammatory meds.

Is it common for people on the spectrum to be hyper sensitive to being unwell. She has not been physically unwell for years, but is mentally on guard with anxiety most of the time.
I don't know what to do should my daughter be unwell in the next morning of her first day of work experience. Obviously
I'd have to ring and explain, but i'm hoping heat packs and small light massage may help her be ok.

thanks for reading, just want to understand if this is common about the hyper sensitivity, and I know neck pain can be really bad, though, she just looks really distressed.

My experience has been that YES, people with ASD or even other mental health issues (like OCD, Anxiety) are definitely going to be hypervigilent about getting sick or unwell, and hyper-focused on it when they are. Having other sensations that are unpleasant are :
1)confusing because they are not the norm
2) upsetting especially if the person is rigid about their life routine
3)difficult to understand because there's all that anxiety, which can prevent us from rationally understanding what is causing the sensations (or if your child is not cognatively able to understand what is happening)
4)Our kids will hyperfocus on the bad sensations (nausea, pain, aches, swellings etc) because this is simply how their minds work. My son generally sees the tiny details rather than the big picture. He does the same with illness or injury.
Often what happens at our house is that his reaction to one symptom can cause another set of symptoms to result. Example: he is so concerned about sleeping on the sore side (right now he has an abcess on left side of his face) that he will be tense and sleep awkwardly to avoid that and wake up with a sore neck or arm. Then he will obsess on those pains.

For us, the better path is to acknowledge the discomfort, but still keep to the schedule. That's basically life, right? We may not feel great, but we still have to do our jobs, meet expectations, and to continue to do those expected things can give some distraction to the discomfort. It's never easy.

Sher

Thank you @Sher, Your post is very helpful to me and you are right that being over anxious about one pain, can tense the body and mind so much that a new pain can often result. I was concerned because daughter's one side of shoulder was much higher than the other side and she just didn't use that painful side for 4 days.
Initially her elevated anxiety started to rub off on me, and I was beginning to wonder if more sinister illness was at play, but I pulled back from it. I learnt a good pressure point for neck pain and its called 'lou zhen' my daughter was more relieved than all the pain meds and tiger palm for her pain.

leisel

Hi, it's my first time posting here and I'm Irish, apologies if my language isn't the norm. In Ireland, anecdotally amongst parents, ASD kids are recognised as having "different" stress and illness responses. eg being very ill without fever or usual signs. In the case of my daughter we've recently found it's probably linked to her diagnosis of Joint Hypermobility Syndrome (Sometimes also known as Ehler Danlos Type III). This can be linked to dysautonomia. dinet.org You could also take a look at the Beighton scale to see if it's likely that hypermobility is involved for your daughter. It's a condition that can be coexisting with autism and, unfortunately, hormonal changes during puberty can accentuate the difficulties for young women. Sufferers report that additional stress can be debilitating.