Narcissistic Personality Disorder - how to cope?

Your block of flats seem quite problematic. Is this anything to do with the neighbour who was behaving strangely a while back?

Was it not your neighbour you thought may have dementia who scolded your husband in front of the gardener?

Is it just me who is a bit ?

Four flats, a Company Secretary and a Director for each of the four flats? Is that correct?
What if there is only one person living in a flat - do they take on dual roles?

Why is this young accountant of a Company Secretary forcing you out? Is that what she has said she intends to do? Does she live in one of the flats?
Are you a psychiatrist and able to diagnose narcissism?
There seems to be a lot of narcissism in your block of four flats - one diagnosed, one possible, and one you think does not have any of the tendencies but you don't sound sure?

I may be missing something here but I don't quite get the picture at all.

I think we're discovering more about the OP than the neighbours.
Just sit back. Live and let live.

Yes, I was trying to find a motive for the strange behaviours of my 84 year-old upstairs neighbour, and now the Company Secretary. I am trying to make sense of what has become a very complex situation. In all our years we have never fallen out with anyone, and suddenly, now we have a flooded flat, and two of the flat dwellers are turning out to be really, really horrible.

We are not very often there, but get stuck in helping out the neighbours, supervising the garden and shared gardener. My husband is very practical and a knowledgeable amateur gardener, and gets on well with the gardener who needs a lot of support.

My husband is naturally perspicacious, and should have been a psychiatrist, but it is me that blunders around trying to find out what motivates people to be nasty. We have nieces and nephews who have done entire degree courses in conflict resolution where NGOs learn how to deal with very unpleasant people - perhaps I should ask them.

The obvious path to me was that the upstairs neighbour, because of her age, could be suffering unduly and so respond unkindly to our situation: so an ameliorating circumstance. However, the upstairs neighbour obviously does not have dementia. And I now think that the Company Secretary has manipulated the upstairs neighbour to think of us as aggressive bullies with no justification whatsoever.

Let live is not so easy, as we have to keep consulting the Company Secretary to allow us to spend money on repairing the faulty drains which were the cause of our flooded flat.

There are 4 privately owned flats, in which we all live (none rented out) each with a nominated director who has a vote. One of the Directors is made the Company Director, to manage the block. The simplest solution would be to sack the Company Secretary, but requires the agreement of the majority. We had a brilliant company secretary until he moved last year, who regrets appointing her.

In the meantime, blundering around attempting to de-conflict....!

I am becoming an expert on NPD as my mother is a huge narcissist.
Every narcissist will have what is known as a “flying monkey” this is someone who is easily manipulated and will side with the narcissist and is basically their messenger.
It is impossible to negotiate with an NPD sufferer as they are never wrong.
They also love to have “ smear campaigns” and are capable of convincing other people of heinous behaviour.
My only advice would be to create a paper trail of evidence and use letter or email as your only method of correspondence.
Public humiliation by the way is something my mother was a master of! That and the death glare that bore through me. She is now 89 and demented, partly due to all the lies she told perhaps? She is now pathetic and powerless having squandered her life.
So very sad.

If you want to deflect conflict, stop diagnosing other people with unflattering labels.

All mediation has to begin with good intentions and respect.

I am sure you can get legal advice on your situation and just want GN to confirm that your judgement of everybody else as wrong is correct.

If there are only 4 of you involved, and one other is in favour of the person you so despise, then perhaps it is time for you to move, hardly any point staying there if you are going to involve yourself in on going battles.

Calling people narcisstic is not the way forward at all.

Are you suggesting dementia is caused by one's nature and not something which can hit anyone

My question was to Missfoodlove

I'm just wondering Heckter, who decided to employ a gardener that needed a lot of supervision and who decided that your husband should be the one to supervise the gardener?
Or is it something that he decided to take on?

Gosh missfoodlove that’s one bitter account so you feel vindicated because your elderly mother has dementia wow

As you say that you are not there very often, is this your main abode Heckter?

I’m not bitter,just sad that my mother squandered a life that could have been happy and positive.
I still make sure she gets the best help and treatment because despite everything she is my mother.
Unless you had suffered at the hands of a narcissist you would not understand the grim reality.

Questions here:
1) why is one of the directors designated to manage the block? When DMiL lived in a similar set-up, all management decisions went to the board, who voted on the issue and decisions were made that way. DMiL lived in a Victorian house conversion. There were very few decisions to be made about care and maintenance.

It is the norm for one director to be appointed 'Chairman of the Board'. That means they chair the board meetings and keep order, actions are the responsibility of the Company Secretary, who reports to the board. Money should be handled by the Treasurer, who does not have to be the Company Secretary and who also reports to the board

2) The Company Secretary does NOT control the purse strings. He/she acts on the instructions of a majority vote. If they do not approve of the expenditure, they resign. They cannot refuse to spend money as directed by the other directors. Ideally money should be handled by a separately designated Treasurer.

It seems to me that you should find yourself an online site/book/ solicitor and find out about how such a company as yours should be run and what are the legal rights and duties of the directors and officers. You could also speak to Citizens Advice Bureau (CAB) who could advise you or point you in the direction of a suitable expert.

I would stop worrying about the psychological make-up of your fellow directors and concentrate on making sure that you know how the company, legally, should be run and insisting that it is run by the rules.

Dementia is of course a random disease however as my mothers memory deteriorated I could see her struggling not to become trapped in her own web of deceit.
She really didn’t know what lies she had told or to whom. This caused her great distress.

She is now 89 and demented, partly due to all the lies she told perhaps?
Really?
There must be a moral in that somewhere, ie always tell the truth and you won't get dementia.

That's a new one on me.

Jalima1108
There are papers written that support the belief of frontotal dementia being aggrivated in patients with NPD.

Yep, definitely a split personality in this lot.

Along with verbal diarrhea...needs unblocking with the drains...perhaps the Psychiatric, Psychotic, should have been a psychiatrist husband could sort the lot of you out.

Tell her that as a courtesy to all of the residents you will copy her e-mails to each of them.

Do you mean Fronto-temporal dementia aka frontal lobe dementia which is a rarer form of dementia?

Sorry but I am not comfortable with this thread

Heckter - this reminds me of the situation with my mother's block of 12 flats. It's put me right off buying a flat in future.
I agree with M0nica that you should keep an eye on the way the company is run and make sure no-one is lining their own pockets.
In my mother's block there is a management company with 3 directors, one of whom is appointed Chair.
For years the Chair paid no service charges on the grounds that he should receive payment for being Chair, even though there was an appointed Managing Agent who also acted as Company Secretary. The Chair continued to benefit from the services everyone else paid for. the residents were paying twice over for management by the Chair and the Managing Agent.
In reality the other 2 Directors were just his puppets and the management fees he thought he was entitled to were hidden in the annual accounts and described to look like payments to the Managing Agent.
He was eventually rumbled and voted out but the numbers involved here are much smaller.
My advice is to ignore the rudeness and get on with your life. No-one can force you out of your own home.

It would be difficult for us to comment on somebody's psyche without having many instances of unreasonable behaviour but if she is narcissistic, your life could be made a living hell so you might consider whether it is worth living there. Do you think you might be feeling over defensive for your husband? I know that if anybody treats somebody I love even the slightest unfairly, I can become very sensitive about it and defensive of them. It may be that his efforts aren't quite as appreciated as you think they should be but the other residents are too kind to say.
It sounds like a very stressful situation having been flooded out and it is easy to become embroiled in a fight if you are stressed. Of course, it may be that you are being completely reasonable. If so, keep your communications polite and equitable so if the Company Secretary is easily shown to be unreasonable, it will quickly show. Is there a grievance procedure you can use? It would seem a sensible thing to have in place and if there isn't one, perhaps you can be instrumental in getting one.

Managing flats like this always seems to be a nightmare. I have the role in my building where we all have a share of the freehold and I hate it but I am the only resident owner the other owners mostly living abroad. The problem is that the alternative is to get in managing agents who cost a lot and are usually useless. Do t know what the solution is but it makes me long for the simplicity of my house