“It’s that Internal Struggle”: Grenfell Residents Lived Experience of Psychological Distress, Post-Fire, 14-06-17. An Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis.

The Grenfell Tower Fire occurred on June 14th, 2017, leaving residents displaced, shocked, and many dead. The tower, owned by the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea (RBKC), had no smoke alarms, sprinklers, or fire exits. The fire engulfed the morality of social reason, caused psychological and physical injury, and has weathered but not stopped brave residents and community members. The racialisation of Grenfell Tower can be used to understand Grenfell Residents as a racialised populace. This brings attention to societal structural inequalities that hold these praxes together. In terms of Grenfell Residents, there have been reported elevated levels of PTSD and suicidal rates in conjunction with low engagement with therapeutic services. Research conducted so far in the community has highlighted non-culturally diverse interventions, which brings to focus how psychological distress is conceptualised for racialised populaces, such as Grenfell Residents. The current evidence base on psychological distress reflects empirical evidence and vague definition, generally and within post-disaster research. Amongst racialised populaces, Eurocentric ideas of psychological distress exist. Thus, the need for further exploration.

Therefore, semi-structured interviews were conducted with six participants. Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis was used to analyse data. The analysis bounded the research through a Counselling Psychology lens, paying attention to social justice and humanistic values in the field. This produced four superordinate themes and eleven subordinate themes: (1) “The Double-Edged Sword”: Grenfell as Meaning (2) “Mummy’s Dying Inside”: The Internalisation Of Suffering; (3) “Your Purpose In Life Is Still There”: The Internal Becoming The External; (4) “The Warpath Of Understanding The System”: External Wound. The study aimed to build an inclusive, expansive understanding that may be used to improve intervention and conceptualisation(s) of psychological distress in the future. Results from this study can assist with the re/de-construction of psychological distress and intervention for medical, political, social, psychological and community understanding.