Beyond Individual Coping: Daily Living Conditions Which Negatively Shape the Wellbeing of Women Engaged in Sex Work in Barbados

Abstract Investigations of the mental health of women engaged in sex work in the Global South hardly explore how daily living conditions created by unjust social and systemic structures might be giving rise to distress that is beyond alleviation when only individual coping strategies are used. Consequently, we collaborated with a local community-based organization to conduct a phenomenological grounded theory study of the wellbeing needs of 30 Black women engaged in sex work in Barbados. In this paper, we report on the impoverished and gendered violent daily living conditions, exacerbated by stigma, which manifested as emotional distress for these women. We illustrate how these living conditions, grounded in colonial legacies, neocolonialism and neoliberalism, are beyond the control of the women. We provide recommendations for developing policies and programs in Barbados toward improving these living conditions and ultimately relieving the women’s distress. We suggest key areas for future research with women engaged in sex work in Barbados and similar contexts in the Global South.