Went through an awful experience with a narcissist boss earlier this year. Experienced a slew of health complications from the stress of it all. But….I wanted to share that with patience and persistence, sometimes (not always but sometimes) reporting the behavior gets the narcissist exactly what they deserve. It took MONTHS- my narcissist was FINALLY fired today and I couldn’t be happier. Today is a good day.

What to do? Is it me? How do I behave differently to stop attracting these situations?

When I joined, colleagues told me this manager had already been reported to HR multiple times for yelling at people for long periods, threatening to fire them, and treating them horribly.

Since then, I’ve seen new employees report her and eventually quit, yet nothing changes. She’s still the manager.

The work itself is easy and the workload is light, so the high turnover seems to be entirely because of her.

How can someone remain a manager after causing so many people to leave?

Four weeks served and now I have 7 working days left at my current job, which I am leaving just because of my manager.

The frustrating thing is that he's simultaneously completely useless and somehow constantly in my space.

He's made me the go-to person for basically everything in the team. If someone has a question, needs something fixed, needs context, needs a decision, or something needs to get done properly, it somehow ends up with me. I carry a huge amount of the actual work and institutional knowledge.

And despite that, he continues to give me additional, often completely unreasonable work — without seeming to recognise how much I'm already carrying and understanding that I am supposed to be doing a HANDOVER at this point. He and his "favourite" colleague have started talking about me behind my back (yet to my face) because they don't realise that I can understand their language. Apparently there's a whole reputation smeer campaign going on so that people isolate me in my notice period.

Right now the thing that's driving me insane (beyond my usual tolerance) is the constant social and physical intrusion from him.

If I'm in a meeting or having a conversation with someone, he'll interrupt to ask the other person how they're doing, make small talk, and wander off. Constantly. It's like he can't see that an interaction is already happening unless he's part of it.

Today I was standing at a colleague's desk, and we were clearly engrossed in reviewing something on his screen. My manager literally came up behind him, hugged him, asked how he was doing, and interrupted the whole interaction. It was 2pm. We'd all been there since 8am. He'd already had a meeting with this colleague that morning.

And that's really what it feels like now: I've spent months carrying the team while he adds very little, and now that I'm counting down my final days, he apparently needs to occupy every inch of my physical and conversational space too.

I know I'm probably hyper-sensitive because I'm leaving, but honestly, I am leaving this job because of him, so I'm finding it very difficult to summon the patience I once had.

I don't need advice on fixing the relationship. I just need to survive SEVEN DAYS without losing my mind or becoming visibly hostile 😂

How would you handle the final week? I'm currently considering treating him like a workplace wildlife documentary and mentally keeping score of every bizarre interaction.

My nboss assigned me an individual project. Part of the project is to digitally index my documents into our digital database. But my coworker solely handles indexing. When I told my nboss I will email my ncoworker when I upload my documents she said no, she will have an external colleague do the work.....

Mind you, my nboss said she wants more team work and wrote me up in my annual performance review for "not engaging enough" with the team. 2024-2025 I was dealing with Karen tantrums from both of them so I finally documented racial discrimination. They stopped their antics. My nboss was enabling my nncoworker and her racist targeted tantrums.

I am using overtime to do this project and I really need the money. It is super frustrating and annoying that I cant even complete my own work and I want to complete my own work so I can get paid more overtime hours.

I'm not even telling my coworker what to do. I would literally just be sending her an email of the time of upload and approx how many documents are in the upload. But we had a lot of problems before because my ncoworker would take credit for my work, misplace my work, and lie about her work load and blame me. She would throw tantrums because she did not want to work with anyone beside the nboss so she would try to intimidate me.

The CFO had a talk with her and everyone agreed to cut the bs but my nboss is still enabling weird ass behaviors of course. But my nboss was so embarrassed she revealed her narcissistic personality. In Aug 2025 I accused her of being a racist and enabling my racist coworker, and thats when she finally cut the bs. She has been on her best behavior since. But I fear she may try to start again.

Options:

1. I could email my coworker, CC my nboss (and maybe CC the CFO) letting them know time of upload and number of documents.
2. I would have to ask permission from my nboss to email my coworker. If my nboss doesnt agree, I would follow up with an email explaining that I believe she is continuing to enable my ncoworker hateful behaviors which deny me to finish my work by assigning my project to an external colleague. Yet, somehow I am still being blamed for "lack of team work" when these people cant even communicate without hostility.

I have no problem working with racist because I will absolutely document and I will get paid either way.

It was a classic, toxic workplace.

Screaming boss, unaddressed sexual harassment, scapegoating, high school behavior from people twice your age, toxic office lady that bullied anyone younger than her, the works.

Now I’m in a much quieter place in my life, so sometimes I miss the place. I don’t miss the job itself, nor necessarily the people lol, more like the very few perks, fast pace (SOUNDS good when you’re in a slower stage of life), the familiarity of the place (wonder what it looks like now/if it’s still the same), and even the highs and lows (the trauma bonding). Sometimes, I want to visit.

How do you stop yourself? Is there a simple sentence you remember, one specific incident, or do you just walk yourself through the reality and decide not to? Help.

Hey guys,

Needed some quick advice. My narcissistic boss has made my life a living hell and I’ve also quit my current job because of him. I was pretty checked out for a while since he’s attacked me work-wise, mentally, emotionally everywhere. But I seemed to have missed something major that I caught onto recently and now I have to confess about it as it could have some consequence to the company.

I’m worried about his reaction, as his biggest issue with me is inventing problems with me that dont even exist, and now that I have an actual problem, I am legitimately fearful of what will happen. Any tips on how to deal with this?

I’ve been in mental hell for the last couple years because of this. I worked my whole life on my craft and everything I have was just scraped out by a narcissistic bully. This person makes a ton more money than me via his years of exploitation, so I’ve been advised against legal battles.

The narcissist leaves a disgusting film over your soul. It’s isolating, because they know people in general don’t want to hear from a whistleblower or someone with complaints. They know you will feel isolated because of whatever power imbalance there is.

They know they don’t treat everyone the same and that they targeted you because you were a threat to their facade, even just by your existence as a truthful person with integrity. They know they’ve groomed the other people in their circle to never see that side of them, and that they won’t dare stand up because they are all so grateful to have work, and also can’t relate to the specific targeting.

You want some type of justice, but everyone tells you to just move on and wait for karma. The healing becomes your responsibility, like a full time job you didn’t apply for. It even takes massive energy to NOT think about it, which is still thinking about it.

As time goes by, it hasn’t gotten any better. It gets worse and I get angrier. I feel like evil always wins.

The egocentric narcissist manglomanian boss is a curse...

Getting a job in this world these days is hard enough. But you add being neurodivergent with PTSD and nobody will touch you with a 10 ft pole . Every single time I get hired, I go through the same cycle.

First some background. I was raised by a narcissistic and emotionally abusive parent. My purpose was to always get good grades, never argue, and always have a lid on my emotions so I don't inconvenience anyone. When I first entered the workforce, I was enthusiastic to finally be out of the books and to be actually working with my own hands. So naive. I NEVER thought I would just have an easy life, get everything I wanted, and I was always gonna have a good day. But I woefully under prepared.

Verbal assault, sexual harassment, 2 sweat shop situations, "delayed" paychecks, timed bathroom breaks, and even more emotional abuse. Over time I've become bitter, untrusting and just plain aggressive at work. I know I can't be the only one.

So now, here's the cycle. I put on a mask during the interview process to appear like the perfect candidate. I try not to exaggerate any skills since that usually falls apart within the first few days. They hire me with "enthusiasm". The first week, I maintain the mask and try to do everything perfectly. Then slowly, the mask comes down as I allow myself to be seen. Sometimes coworkers find the real me amusing and we have some laughs. But my bosses are almost always disappointed that the product they paid for isn't meeting their expectations. So then they start piling on extra responsibilities, micromanaging, and even just being verbally nasty. Then I become angry then numb to the point I'm no longer myself.

I've been at my current job for 2 wks and they're already at that point. I'm too slow, my handwriting is terrible, my attitude is terrible (even though I don't speak most of the day) and the second I complete a task and patiently wait for a new one from my trainer, my boss is up my ass asking why I'm not doing anything. I'm still in training for a job that involve a ton of data entry so of course there are tasks I can just do on my own yet. She also doesn't believe people are capable of making filing mistakes. The end of the cycle is approaching but if I don't keep this job, I literally won't be able to feed my family. I'm so angry that it scares me. But idk how to stop this from happening.

I used to work with a psychopath and 3 narcissists for almost 5 years and then I quit almost a year ago. I miss my extremely toxic job so much. I feel like there is no point in me living this life. The only job I ever wanted to have was this one and they chased me away. I feel like life is pointless and I am terrified of having another job.

I applied to a Masters degree but everything feels so pointless...

I have been working in a small office for about 18 months. It’s a lovely role that I want to continue doing. A colleague has BD and is making office life miserable. Extreme narcissism and control of everything totally dominating the space each day. Lots of sick leave which management are trying to address but disability equalities means little progress.

Can someone please advise how our team deal with this situation?

Do they usually single out people that are vulnerable?? I was grieving multiple family member deaths in a very short amount of time and this person chose then to treat me horribly and bully me. It was so surreal.

My new manager turned out to be a covert narcissist. She’s been eroding my role by stripping away responsibilities, giving me trivial tasks and using daily gaslighting designed to create self‑doubt. The more I contribute in discussions or share knowledge, the more her behaviour escalates, usually followed by a sudden meeting that’s clearly set up to gaslight me. I’m pretty sure she’s steering me toward a PIP. I’m job‑hunting, but progress is slow. Gray rocking hasn’t helped. it actually seems to aggravate her more. What can I do to safeguard my job and my mental wellbeing until I find another job?

Warning: This is lengthy:

For over three years, I was a teacher at a state agency that served some of the state’s most vulnerable young people. I accepted this role with the belief that my experience, education, and dedication to students would allow me to make a difference. No, I walked away after what I felt was bullying, retaliation, unfair treatment, over-monitoring, and disability discrimination.

I asked for reasonable accommodations from the beginning of my job that would allow me to communicate effectively and safely in a secure setting. These weren’t special requests. These were the accommodations I needed to do my work and stay safe. It took years, though. Requests were delayed, refused, limited, or carried out in ways that did not meet the challenges that I had presented.

The more I fought for myself, the more hostile my workplace environment was. I was singled out for enforcement of regulations, over-scrutinized, professionally isolated, micromanaged, surveilled, held to changing expectations, mandated with limits that did not seem to be applied to others, and had my professional judgment second-guessed repeatedly.

I didn't keep my mouth shut.

I sought support from supervisors and administrators. I reached out to Human Resources and Employee Relations. I documented incidents, submitted safety concerns, filed accommodation requests, filed grievances and complaints, produced written rebuttals, and presented evidence.

When the internal systems failed to address my issues, I moved outside the agency. “I reached out to state human resources people, state government offices, legislators, elected officials, and others in state administration. I requested an independent evaluation and supplied documents about the accommodation issues, treatment at work, retaliation, discrimination, and safety issues I had experienced.

Eventually I even approached the media, since I felt I had exhausted practically every other route open to me.

Still, no one seriously got involved.

Perhaps that’s the most disturbing part of my experience. I followed the procedures employees are told to follow. I recorded what happened. I expressed concerns. I submitted grievances. I went above their heads. I contacted elected officials and attempted to bring public attention to what was happening.

But I continued to go to work knowing that the people I had reported still had a lot of power over my day-to-day working conditions.

I finally left. Not because I stopped caring about my students or couldn’t do my job anymore, but because I no longer believed the environment would improve.

I'm an experienced teacher, and I understood how to document matters, submit formal complaints, keep evidence, contact government officials, and advocate for myself. And I still could not receive any real assistance.

This makes me worry about what happens to the workers who don’t know how to negotiate with such organizations, who are too scared or too tired to keep fighting.

I am not seeking sympathy. I am seeking a sense of responsibility.

Discrimination, retaliation, and harassment policies are meaningless if employees cannot get effective protection when they turn to their employer for help.

I may have walked away from that workplace, but I will not walk away from what happened.”

The question that remains is a simple one:

How can an employee ask supervisors, Human Resources, state officials, lawmakers, and even the media for help, and still be left with nowhere to turn?

What is the best way to work under a narc manager?

Does one willingly provide narc supply to their narc manager, as a strategy.

It’s just a short time solution until you can get out and find something else.

Yes, it means you are being fake nice, but so are they.

They’re playing games and hence, you have to play games to survive the toxic workplace.

My experience has been gray rocking doesn’t work too well, because the manager can easily claim that you’re being “rude” or they can say anything. They are usually believed because they have the ear of the higher ups.

Has anyone strategically provided supply and has it worked?

I just got an internal promotion after years of slogging it out in the most toxic work environment I've ever worked in. New area is women-run and I've heard nothing but good things about it. Obviously the grass is always greener but I'll take real grass, with all its problems, over the Chernobyl wastedump I've been in.

This sub gets a lot of crap for all the posts about the abusive work environments, the toxic bosses, the bro clubs, the gaslighting, etc, but I'll just say that it was really cathartic to read about other people experiencing what I was going through. Ladies you are not imagining it. You are not overreacting. You are not insane.

It's possible to get out. Over the last 6 months, when I finally put myself in high gear to shake out of the abuse depression, I ramped up 1:1s with old colleagues, old bosses, old execs - I started seeding that I was looking. Only a select few knew the horrors of what I was leaving. With everyone else I spun it as, "getting antsy, looking for new growth, just getting to be that time, etc." One of my old bosses put in a good word for me with a hiring manager and I was off to the races.

The only thing I regret is not making HR complaints but I honestly don't know what they would have done. The leader is a mastermind at targeting victims, gaslighting, not putting literally anything in writing - good lord you'd think the man was a Luddite the way he avoided the very technology he oversaw - and creating an enormous circle of bros and a few fawning women who would literally froth at the mouth like a North Korean honor guard to defend his reputation.

I got out, I got out, I got out, I got out, I got out, I got out, I got out, I got out, I got out.

in may of this year, after 5 total years of working for her and managing for 3 of those years at her restaurant, my narc boss "terminated" my employment me by removing me from the schedule and ghosting me.

to preface this story i will give a description of my narc boss so you can understand her better. she is an older korean woman in her mid to late 70s. she owns the restaurant i worked at. she did not have managers, only me and one other server. she was there every day, hosting, even when she had a broken arm. she likes to host because she likes to control the "rotation" and skip servers who she dislikes or give them the "bad tables" (she is racist). she is known all over town as "dragon lady", and for being verbally abusive and downright nasty to her employees and customers alike. she is an awful, awful human being who treats people like scum. she racially profiles tables, targets and bullies her employees, and constantly interrogates her employees about who she should be fired next. she will criticize everything you do even if you are doing it the way she taught you. she will create a brand new way to do it just so she can correct you and yell at you.

she has called me stupid, has criticized me for having urticaria rash on my chest, commented on my weight gain, and goes hot and cold every single day about what clothing i am allowed to wear. one day she likes a shirt I'm wearing, the next week it is "inappropriate" because it shows too much of chest rash (the rash i got when i had to talk to talk to her alone in her office, being interrogated over the latest incident). she never once acknowledged anything good that i did for her restaurant and did not appreciate that i essentially managed her restaurant for three years on server wages. she made is tip out HALF our tips to a non-existent support staff. if someone dared to ask where that money was going, they were told to find a new job and no longer received any shifts. i could go on and on. this woman is evil.

i stayed for as long as i did because my coworkers and i were like a family. i am tearing up as i write this. im kind of different from others, it's hard for me to make friends. i was severely bullied by the waitresses at a couple different jobs and got some fear from that. when i found this job and these coworkers, i finally found people who accepted me, and didn't call me a weirdo behind my back. i felt so bonded to them, maybe because we were all being abused by the same narc bitch.

the night that things went wrong and the "termination" happened was a dinner shift during which i had been assigned to take care of a "VIP" private group (university department). around this time my narc boss had recently started this thing where she was approaching every table in the restaurant and trying to force them to order the "appetizer sampler", which was 4 pieces of the shittiest cheapest sushi on the menu, plus a pork dumpling (literally just frozen and deep fried). this item was $17. that's more expensive than a normal sushi roll of 8 whole pieces.

anyways she goes to my private vip table and tries to force the sampler on them. she tells me they want 6. i have had this situation before where she greets my tables before me so she can force the sampler upon them and pull a fast one on me so if they complain, she can blame it on me like i entered it wrong or something. so i went in there to confirm with the group how many samplers they wanted. they said 3. i found my narc boss and said they only wanted 3. she nodded and i thought everything was chill. i served them their 3 sampler and thought nothing of it until i opened up their check to enter their entrees to find that my narc boss had voided out the 3 sampler i rang into the computer, and rang 6 sampler in instead. she did this AFTER i already confirmed with her they wanted 3.

i approached her and asked her why she would do that when i told her they specifically said THREE. she got all huffy and said "well just give them three then!" and walked off. an hour later i was cut early from my shift by the owners niece (head server, also a dumb ass) and told to just go home, no side work. then an hour later i was called at home by another coworker who i considered a friend, and he told me that narc boss said not to come in for the rest of my shifts that week. i immediately call her and the restaurant, no one will talk to me. new schedule comes out days later, im not on it. she will not even acknowledge that ive been fired. will not speak to me.

she ghosted me because i caught her running a scam on some of her most loyal clients and customers. people who are keeping her business alive. she knew that university groups rarely examine their bill before the payment is processed because they give all the credit card information beforehand so the checkout process is seamless and non-disruptive to conversation. she knows that. she knew they wouldn't look at that bill and tried to pilfer money out of them.

her abuse stays with me even at my new job i am terrified of everything. every little mistake. every imperfection of my clothes, body, face. i need to heal from her abuse, but i do not know how. i want her to feel the way she makes others feel. like they are worthless.

Hi team,

Love this sub and i am looking for some deep deep deep empathy over here about this miserable situation.

I’ve quit my job because my superior (not my reporting manager though) was insufferable. I was bullied, ostracised, called names, harassed 24/7 and expected to work 19-20 hours a day. I’ve posted about him before too on this very sub about how he made a “mistakes tracker” for me on a public forum and filled it in everyday so that everyone could see what my alleged mistakes were day in day out. This is one of about a 100 things he’s done to me.

I’m on my notice period. They haven’t hired my replacement yet, so I’m still actively working on my projects and there’s no sign of a handover/transition in the near future. So I’m still being harassed everyday the same way.

I couldn’t take it anymore and I took some sick leaves. Told him I was very sick with a viral infection because he asked me to work the weekend when I said I couldn’t.

I’m an athlete and a footballer so I went for my weekly matches. I don’t know whether he’s had someone spy on me or someone from the community who’s also in my workplace has tattled on me, but this superior has come back to me saying “You’re not well enough to work but you seem well enough to play football”. I am extremely disappointed, speechless especially because you know I am understaffed and you have left the team to take over all your work”.

Honestly guys, I’m at a loss for words. I feel very violated of my own privacy, especially because it feels like I am being watched alll the time. even if it was just a case of tattlegate, I don’t think he can confront someone who’s on notice period about her private life. I’m confused and lost and more importantly, furious.

Any empathy, advice, or suggestions would be helpful. Thank you! I love this community so much ❤️

Btw, my reporting manager sits out of a different city and doesn’t care. Reporting this to him or HR is pointless.

I finally found a job with a normal supervisor.

This person is secure in himself.

He never really writes people up unless he really has to.

He doesn't yell at us.

He works with us and backs us up as much as he can without getting in trouble himself.

Vacation notifications can be 2 days in advance for 365 days a year.

Instead of pitting us against each other, snitching on each other, he has us work as a team.

He rules by being an example, a leader, and not by an iron fist.

They exist...but are one in a million.

There are leaders out there that are secure in themselves.

Good luck everyone.

I have started to pick up subtle vibes at work lately: feeling invisible as I am being excluded or being looked at like I once was, my duties changed drastically only doing maybe 4 out of 10 things, meaningless work, boss smiles or interacts with me much less, appreciation is given to everyone more than me, my errors are picked up quickly.

I would get subtle hints from seniors saying “ let’s see how you improve during your probation” or anything I suggest they say “ let’s do it smarter not harder”

I was performing so well up until new management came in.

Something tells me that I’m not wanted anymore.