My ladies in corporate - how do you deal with other POC undermining you?

Hi my beautiful Black ladies!

For the backstory: I work in finance, born & raised in NYC. After a brief stint of unemployment last October, that stretched into March of this year.. I started working at a financial institution that I was familiar with when I was in my old role. The area of finance I’m in is compliance - but the area of compliance is super niche so everyone works at the same 5,6 firms, and knows everyone. I started at my job in April, so we’re coming up to the 5 month mark & I’m gonna be honest - I’m MF TIREDT.

The team I’m on is VERY SMALL, and only consists of myself, my manager, and the senior associate. The senior associate has been in our area of finance for 2 years, came into the role blind & our manager trained her (he works remotely - her and I are in office at least 4 days, but we can work from home a few days a week if needed)

At first, everything was cool. Her and I got along well, and I learned very quickly (a lot of what we do I was already familiar with because I’ve been in this specific area of compliance for almost 4 years now) .. the last two months have been a clusterf*ck because she got married & someone suffered a medical emergency at her wedding & then would later pass away. The entire month leading up to her wedding I was pulling late nights, early mornings, even worked in the uber until I got to the ceremony. My manger and I were both invited to the wedding along with another coworker that is cool with her and I. So since the 3 of us saw all of this play out, we decided we were gonna support this girl however she needed. Upon her return to the office two weeks later - she was very quiet, reserved & rightfully so. Then I took some time off because I was running on fumes myself & while I was gone, instead of her handling the report that I took over briefly .. she waited until I came back to passive aggressively tell me that I still had to do it & that she would pick it back up the next week.

Now: It’s been a month since her wedding, and she’s acting very standoffish. I had some things going on in my personal life & you know we don’t get the same grace “they” do (she’s Indian btw). My manager proposed to his girlfriend and because I didn’t shit in my hands and clap in the slack chat he proceeded to slack her on the side and make a comment about what I said (which I saw) .. keep in mind the Friday before he proposed I was very chatty, being supportive and she was silent. She proceeded to say in the group channel that she was logging off for the day and to ask if we needed anything. I asked her to run a report and was ignored.

Then we had a team meeting yesterday and during our 1:1 my manager informed me that “She’s the senior associate and while no she’s not my boss but if she’s asking me to do something I need to just do it and to look at it as teamwork” when keep in mind, she’s passively aggressively doing things such as not being supportive when I need help, or ask for it, or she’ll respond snidely. Others in the office amongst our department have noticed her change in behavior but our boss clearly doesn’t because he doesn’t work in the office every day & tbh he placates her a LOT.

I’ve been documenting all of our interactions to CYA, especially because I am NOW the ONLY black woman in the entire firm. They even fired the temp at the front desk and in my short tenure here - I’ve seen a HIGH turnover rate, but because of the economy & the job market .. I really can’t afford to give up this job.

Yes; I’ve been maintaining professionalism, keeping my receipts, and trying to not let her shift my energy. It’s so real I gotta listen to gospel my entire train ride & when I pray I pray EXTRA hard that she doesn’t come in the office because her energy just stinks & I’m a Gemini born & raised in East Flatbush Brooklyn- I’m really like that & I’d really do it to her but I actually like the firm, the people I work with (outside of her) and the money is really good especially with the economy moving the way it’s been moving.

Here for any and all uplifting comments & advice 🫶🏾