Medical Disability for Federal & Postal Employees: Once Known, Now…

Writers and other artists populate that field — of being once known, mostly during their lifetime; if lucky, for a period of time thereafter, but now….

The ellipsis is meant to convey the idea of the opposite — that a person once known, but now is unknown; has shrunk back into the arena of anonymity; of having been once famous, or at least “well-known”, but upon death, has now passed among those who, like most of us, barely require an honorable mention, let alone a footnote in history; and, instead, like so many graveyards long forgotten and buried beneath the crawling summers of weeds and the drifting beauty of dandelions’ dispersing seeds, once known, now….

For example — Carlos Baker; who was he?; who remembers him?  He wrote the definitive biography on Ernest Hemingway, and was himself an accomplished short story writer, poet, and well-known during his time.  Most of us would like to have had even a fraction of the reputation and popularity he enjoyed during his lifetime; but in the end, we all return to the dust from whence we came.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition such that the medical condition now prevents the Federal or Postal worker from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal job, the prospect of returning to total anonymity may be a falsely-motivating element in trying to continue and to “fight on”.

Health should be the top priority.  Yes, once you receive an approval for your Federal Disability Retirement, you will no longer be known as “Tom the X, Sally the expert-on-Y, or Julian who is V”; but you will begin to get your health back.

Contact an OPM Disability Lawyer who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law, and fear not the loss of a footnote where you were once known, and now…

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Lawyer
Federal Disability Retirement Attorney

FERS Disability Retirement: Vanishing Point

It was a 1971 movie that had a cult following, about a drug-addicted war hero wagered to transport a high-powered vehicle within a specified period of time from point A to point B.  Whether the story had a discernibly rational plot or not was beside the point; the story entertained, and we gleaned from it whatever points we read into it.

That is probably one of the primary reasons why the movie gained in such popularity: people argued as to the “meaning” of the move and its ending, all the while never realizing that there was never a single answer.

Life is often like that, and perhaps that is why the movie itself gained so much attention.  The meaning we demand from our own lives is often a matter of our own lack of imagination; we ask too much of concepts which have too little to give.  As one of the character’s father stated in a Woody Allen movie, How can one know about the greater questions of the universe when “I can’t even get the can opener to work”?

For Federal and Postal employees who need to file for Federal Disability Retirement benefits, the “vanishing point” may differ from person to person.  What you do not want to do, however, is to let the Agency or the Postal Service to determine the timing, nature, place and context of the “vanishing point” of your career.

Consult with a FERS Disability Attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law, and take control of your own “vanishing point” before a cult following you don’t even know about, develops behind your back.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Federal Disability Retirement: Divide and Conquer

According to Wikipedia, “divide-and-conquer”, in computer science, is an algorithm “design paradigm” which recursively breaks down a problem into multiple “sub-problems” in order to solve each problem separately, by dividing them into manageable sub-sets.  It is the same approach that has been used since Julius Caesar’s time — in war, of first separating large armies into smaller units, then attacking them in coordinated fashion; or in politics, of finding ways where division can be fomented within the ranks of the opposing party or candidate, then defeating them by taking advantage of the internal divisions.

OPM applies the same tactic in denying a Federal or Postal employee’s Federal Disability Retirement application — first by separating each medical condition from the aggregate of the medical conditions, then minimizing the impact of each without regard to the impact resulting from the aggregation and combined symptoms.  Thus, X apart from Y is not as bad as X and Y together, and so if X can be minimized and Y can be marginalized, then each separately may appear to be somewhat insignificant.

Consult with an OPM Disability Retirement Attorney to discuss how to counter OPM’s “divide-and-conquer” approach before the Roman Centurions attack from that rear flank which remains vulnerable because of the divided unit you lead.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Federal Disability Retirement Claims: The present preference

Given the choice, it is almost always the present preference that is chosen, while the long-term goals, aspirations or necessary planning are set aside, ignored, subverted or otherwise delayed for another day.  We prefer to remain in the present circumstances, in lieu of future contexts unknown, for the familiar is always to be preferred to the strange and unrelated.

The key to change away from the present preference is often based upon the spectrum of a “tolerance/intolerance” gauge — an informal, almost unspoken manner in which we react based upon various factors that have developed over many years: tolerance/intolerance of pain levels; quality of life issues, whether consciously realized or intuitively maintained; the balance between weekends encroached and the weekdays approached; whether productivity rises or falls; and other similar factors, both involving professional goals and aspirations as well as personal perspectives upon the worth of maintaining the status quo or allowing for the tumult of change.

Medical conditions often warrant a move away from the present preference.  In reality, no one “prefers” the present when the change is imposed from external sources, or where there is simply little control or influence to exert upon stopping, hindering or otherwise slowing down the change itself.  The present preference is merely borne of laziness or the pure enjoyment of non-change, as the known is almost always preferable to instability and the strangeness of other worlds.

That is why we take short vacations and jaunts to other cultural enclaves, but return home to the safety of our known environments.  But when a medical condition begins to impact one’s ability and capacity to perform one or more of the essential elements of one’s positional duties, as it can with Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, the changes impacted from the external forces of an unwanted medical condition may necessitate the modification of the present preference for the status quo.

Living with a medical condition itself is traumatic enough; altering the present preference of a life one is used to, is almost always a further tumultuous necessity that one instinctively resists, but recognizes the inevitability of.

For Federal and Postal workers who have come to a point of realizing the necessity of modifying the present preference, preparing, formulating and filing an effective OPM Disability Retirement application, to be ultimately submitted to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, is the first step towards conforming to an unfair external influence characterized by the medical condition itself.

Consulting an attorney who specializes in the administrative complexities inherent in the Federal Disability Retirement process will often help to buttress some of the changes that are necessary, if only because information and knowledge allows for the decision-making process to prevail with needed insights presented in order to adapt away from the present preference of an increasingly debilitating medical condition.

Sincerely,

Robert R.McGill, Esquire

 

Federal Disability Retirement Claims: The race that wasn’t

Does it often seem as if one is in the middle of the race, but that all of the rules have been abandoned by all other participants except the one that keeps struggling — you?

The term itself has had a long history of proverbial applications and overused metaphorical usages — of the “race” against time; the “race of life”; of marathon runners, sprinters and the various specialists in the metered world of measured distances.  It is the race that wasn’t that is the one forgotten, however; of the false starts, the disqualifications, the one’s discovered to have used illegal steroids, and the villains who cut across back trails when no one was looking in order to save an extra couple of miles from being detected.

Most races are unfair; they are stacked against one from the very beginning, and the end result is almost always predetermined in one fashion or another.  Is a race that is predetermined as to the outcome of individuals to reach the finish line, truly a race at all?  Do any of us ever enter a “race”, actual, metaphorical or otherwise, and say: Well, I know I am not going to win because the rules won’t allow it, but I am going to run, anyway?

Of course, one may not have a choice in the matter; and, in that case, when the whistle is blown, the flag is brought down or the blank round of the gunshot is fired, one begins to trudge along and try one’s best.  That is how one feels when a medical condition begins to creep upon a person’s health — of the slow, insidious deterioration, where the generality of “life’s unfairness” begins to dawn upon the consciousness of one’s livelihood.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, such that the medical condition begins to prevent, impede, interrupt or otherwise diminish the ability and capacity to perform all of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal job, it may be time to reconsider the “rules of the race”, as the metaphor is often applied, and begin to prepare, formulate and file for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset.

As with all government bureaucracies, the U.S. Office of Personnel Management applies the “rules of the race”, and in order to qualify for the race that wasn’t, you will likely need to consult an attorney who knows all of the relevant rules of the race, including the start time, the length of the process, and what needs to be done in order to reach the finish line.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

FERS & CSRS Disability Retirement Application: The tumescent narrative

The pendulum between a swollen ego and a timid conscience can be wide and vast; or of the difference between panicked shyness amounting to a hermit’s refuge, and arrogance in man that betrays the smallness of one’s heart.  Being “puffed up” is one thing; demanding one’s rights without persuasive argumentation, quite another.

In formulating one’s “story” in preparing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, specifically on SF 3112A, Applicant’s Statement of Disability, the undersigned lawyer has seen – when a person has tried this on his or her own at the First Stage of the process, been rejected, and has come for assistance and legal guidance at the Second Stage of the Process (called the “Reconsideration Stage” before the U.S. Office of Personnel Management) – an underlying tinge of what may be deemed a tumescent narrative:  A delineation of demanding, as opposed to persuading, of asserting, in contrast to revealing, and one of puffing up, in contradistinction to allowing the facts to speak for themselves.

Fear is often the explanation for engaging in a tumescent narrative; for, to cover that fear, arrogance and puffing up is thought to conceal the stench of fright.  What should be the voice, tone and approach in a narrative statement to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management?

Certainly, every story has a tonality that undergirds the telling of it, and even if the voice is absent, the speaker not present, the written delineation will still spill over with a cadence of unmistakable clarity.

Should the voice reveal humility, a begging for an approval?  Should it be demanding, overreaching, iconoclastic in its compelling movement?  Would it be better to be neutral, state the facts and respectfully request a fair review?  What of the references to legal precedents – is there an appropriate tone and gesture to the argumentation and methodological road-map presented to guide and persuade?

Every written narrative – even a few sentences – can reveal a “voice” behind the static nature of the written words.  In preparing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, the Applicant’s Statement of Disability will be a central component of the application packet; and, if an attorney is involved, a legal memorandum should always accompany it by providing a statutory roadmap to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.

What most people do not understand is that the tone and voice of a Federal Disability Retirement packet – with the compendium of medical reports, narrative statements on SF 3112A, legal memorandum and argumentation for persuasion to an approval – can have a shifting tone depending upon what is being addressed.

The tumescent narrative is one which is likened to a mono-tone, and therefore, to a great extent, tone-deaf.  Circumstances should dictate the voice of the narrator; where facts are stated, neutrality is called for; when persuasive argumentation is encompassed, a bold and confident assertiveness.

The effective Federal Disability Retirement packet must embrace a variety of voices, and never allowed to be relegated to the quivering reaction of a tumescent narrative, where fear becomes the guiding principle for an ineffective voice.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

FERS Disability Retirement Application: The tools we have for use

The foundation is always “all-important”; but there are other tools at one’s disposal, and the question is:  Do we know and recognize what those tools are, and if not, how can we use them out of ignorance?

How does SSDI intersect with FERS Disability retirement – not the issue of offsetting the concurrent payments after approval of each (that is merely a monetary calculation that has nothing to do with getting a FERS Disability Retirement application approved); rather, should an approval of an SSDI application have a legal impact upon a FERS Disability Retirement?  How about a denial – but one with a statement in the SSDI denial letter acknowledging that the FERS Disability Retirement applicant is unable to perform the duties of his current/former employment, but may be able to do “other employment”?

How should a mixed removal be utilized to its most effective manner?  If a person is removed partly for his or her medical inability to perform the essential functions of the job, but also because of AWOL issues or excessive LWOP usage, does it undermine the application and efficacy of a Bruner Presumption argument?

What should be done with a Department of Veterans Affairs rating?  Is it always persuasive, never determinative?  Even if persuasive, should it always be introduced, or is discretion the better part of valor – or, in the case of a FERS Disability Retirement application, the better part of value in using it as “proof” for a Federal Disability Retirement application?  Should medical documentation be indiscriminately submitted?

In other words, in a FERS Disability Retirement application, does the FERS Disability applicant have any rights as to dissemination of medical documentation, especially those portions which do not go to the substantive centrality of one’s claim in requesting a Federal Disability Retirement approval?  To what extent can the FERS Disability Retirement applicant and his/her attorney have the right to act as the “gatekeeper” in providing sensitive medical documentation to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management?

Tools – we have them; but of what use, efficacy or relevance are they, if they are left in reserve without pragmatic utilization?  And, as to the “reserve” – should the FERS Disability Retirement applicant keep in tow any of the tools, or should they all be used in an aggregate, cumulative powerhouse of aggressive and forceful argumentation?

Tools – to have them is one thing; to use, another; but more than that, to know what to use, when, how, and to what applicable relevance; that is the power behind the inertness of that which can be enlivened by knowledge, information and discretionary utilization.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

OPM Disability Retirement Law: The cruelty of our nature

Note that we are not positing that nature in general is cruel; for, in nature, predatory behaviors and devouring of one another is merely a tautological definition of nature itself, in the constant balance between prey and predator, betwixt overpopulation and dominance of one species over another, etc.  No, the “our” refers to a specific species – of the human kind.

Whether engendered and triggered within our genetic predispositions, or as Rousseau and Locke would have it, spurred on by the artificial constructs evolved from the social contract created for self-preservation, there is little denying that “our” nature is the cruelest of them all.  Little evidence needs to be pointed at in order to establish the case proving such a perspective – of wars, treatment of others, disregard for fellow members, neighbors and even strangers; no, the cruelty of our nature betrays the inherent meanness of our selves.

Yes, yes – there are always sociological and anthropological explanations – of mistreatment by a structural and inherent canopy of defiance; people left without hope for any future; lives destroyed by government regulations and other societal pressures; wars driven by sectarian and genocidal triggers further explained by economic changes and shifts of monetary and global policies; and of the rise of dominance by a few over the general populace.

There is little doubt that we are cruel because of who we are – at the top of the food chain, everyone struggling to merely survive.  Yet, it was always the belief that within us, there was a spark of the angel – of being just above the beast, and slightly below the heavenly orbs where wings of perfection remain yet to strive for.

When medical conditions erupt, necessitating the Federal or Postal employee to prepare, formulate and file for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, it is well to keep in mind the cruelty of our nature – not necessarily in ourselves, but in the capacity and human capability of acting upon it by revealing to others the vulnerabilities caught in the web of our own genetic predispositions.

Care needs to be taken in protecting privacy; never underestimate the reactions that might occur by a Federal agency or the U.S. Postal Service; and always bear in mind the wisdom of Shakespeare, who recognized the cruelty of our nature, “As flies to wanton boys, are we to the gods.  They kill us for their sport.” King Lear, Act IV, Scene i.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire