I Have No Idea How to Feel

Hi. Coming here because I don’t have anywhere else to go right now and this one is kind of a doozy. But I’ve been struggling with something that happened recently in regards to microaggressions, a group of friends but also with my relationship.

I’m 24F queer in a relationship with 37F, whom I moved across the country for about 3 years ago. Our relationship started off intense but rough in a lot of ways which is important but this particular story starts with a group of friends from school I made since I’ve been here.

A couple of months ago, i invited a girl whom I was getting really close to (my closest friend here) out for an event with my partner and some other friends. I thought everything went great but a few weeks later, she told me she felt that there were microaggressions happenings towards black people. I, of course, reassured her that none of what was said was meant to be any sort of aggression towards black people. (If you’re wondering, one of the things that was brought up was how a friend of mine asked to cross the street when there was a group of men in our path who happened to be black). I reassured her it was for safety only and that it would be the exact same situation if it was Hispanic or white men in a group at night since we were a group of girls.

Mind you, I know I’m not racist/ignorant in any way and the context of everything was super super important. I didn’t want to make her feel bad about coming to me with this but it seemed like she was pretty unwilling to see it any other way. anyways, she said she wouldn’t tell others in the group and we agreed to be okay and still hang in the group. But something changed in her? and i know she is telling others but just not being straight up with me. It almost feels like mean girl/highschool energy but This group meant so much to me since i feel like ive had trouble making meaningful relationships since ive been here. I know that once others hear this, it’s like having a Scarlett letter which i completely understand. I wouldn’t want to hang with someone i heard this about!!

I feel kind of devastated about this because it’s far from who I am as a person. And another part of me feels resentment towards my partner because she was kind of controlling when i first got here and i wasn’t able to create strong friendships with others in the group. So now here i am.

I feel stuck in the middle of being frustrated at the situation but also frustrated at my partner (we’re much better now) but i still feel this resentment. I don’t know what to do with all of these lonely feelings so I’m just putting them here. If you’ve made it through all this post, feel free to chime in or ask questions. I’m just completely at a loss.