FERS Disability Retirement from OPM: A Bang or a Whimper

We live in a universe of extremes.  People cannot have “reasonable beliefs” for, you are then deemed lacking, and in such a state, somehow a person without the passionate character who is a “true believer”.

The “middle point” which was espoused by Aristotle and the Stoics — of having the calm demeanor and not reactively excitable; of a reasoned approach to every issue; of maintaining a demeanor of the Zen Monk; this approach is now considered dead and irrelevant.

We must all be extremists.  Whatever cause we take up, whichever banner we decide to flagrantly exhibit (on our cars or with signs and banners ugli-fying our homes and front yards), we must go out with either a bang or a whimper.  If with a whimper, at least we tried.  If with a bang, then we have succeeded.

In modernity, it matters not what the substance of the issue is; only as to whether we are “passionate” in our feelings.  For, after decades of focusing upon the validation of our feelings (as opposed to cultivating the rational faculty of our souls), we have now succeeded in upending the importance of governing the feelings.

Yet, in the field of law, there is still a need for a rational, reasoned approach, and for Federal and Postal employees who suffer from a medical condition, it is necessary to contact a lawyer who approaches the issue of Federal/Postal Disability Retirement as a matter of legal and medical necessity, and one who sees each case as not a matter of a Bang or a Whimper, but as a legal issue which needs to be approached in a calm, stoic matter — in applying “the Law”.

Contact a FERS Disability Attorney who will not engage in the Social Media and modern approach of great fanfare, but instead, relies still on the stodgy old way of doing things — of actually speaking with the client, explaining the process, and doing the work himself.  Neither with a Bang or a Whimper, but with a straightforward approach of applying the damn law.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill
Lawyer exclusively representing Federal and Postal employees to secure their Federal Disability Retirement benefits under FERS from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.

 

Federal Disability Retirement Benefits: The Balance Between

There is a balance between the extremes; and that is precisely the whole point of Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics — of maintaining the balance between.

Life is full of extremes — of individuals who do nothing, or do too much; of authoritarianism or anarchy; of excessive spending or self-defeating restraint; the key is to find the median, the “middle ground”.

Some would argue, of course, that the mid-point is merely the compromise between the two extremes and thus achieves only a watered-down state of affairs; but that depends upon each individual circumstance.  Is the only option available to succumb to either extreme?

In a Federal Disability Retirement case, the balance between is to file for Federal Disability Retirement benefits.  For, the extremes are: Stay in the job and continue to struggle and to harm yourself by working in a position which continues to be destructive to your health; or, to resign and walk away with nothing.

The balance between is to file for FERS Disability Retirement benefits and seek a different kind of job in the private sector or state government.

Contact a Federal Disability Retirement Lawyer who specializes in OPM Disability Retirement Law, and begin thinking in terms of the balance between.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill
Lawyer specializing exclusively in FERS Disability Retirement Law

 

Help with Disability Retirement from a Federal Agency or the USPS: The Task at Hand

It is the task at hand which must be focused upon — not the “other” things which continue to distract and impede.  Prioritizing in life is a necessity; and if it is difficult to make the judgmental decision of which is sequentially important as opposed to other issues of relative unimportance, then begin by completing the task at hand — whatever it may be — then moving on to the next one, and the next one after that.

Life has become complicated in this brave new world of technology, multi-tasking and electronic universe of virtual realities.  How do we counter the stresses of modernity?  By attending first to the task at hand.

For FERS Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition such that the medical condition no longer allows you to even complete the task at hand — of an essential element in your work — then it is time to contact a Federal Disability Retirement Lawyer who specializes in OPM Disability Retirement under FERS, filed with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.

Such an attorney, if an expert exclusively in Federal Disability Retirement Law, will get the singular task at hand completed and accomplished, by getting an approval from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, and getting you on your way with a Federal Disability Retirement annuity.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Lawyer

 

Federal & Postal Disability Retirement: Case Development

Are all cases at the same stage of the process?  Isn’t this the same question as: Are all people at the parallel stage of maturity?

As life reflects reality in varying aspects of their sliced proportions, so every case is not at the same stage of the process.  Many Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers find themselves at a critical juncture in their careers, where filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits has become a necessity and a step which can no longer be delayed.

Is every case ready for filing?  Likely not.  Should every case be filed, ready or not?  Only if the Statute of Limitations looms and necessitates it.  Is there anything nefarious in “developing” a case?  No.  However, there can be a slight distinction, subtle as it may be, in engaging a trail of medical documentation expressly for the singular purpose of establishing a Federal Disability Retirement claim, as opposed to doing it in order to seek medical attention.

Taking care of one’s medical condition, going to doctor’s appointments and establishing a consistency of compliance with a treatment regimen — these should all, first and foremost, be engaged in with the primary purpose of obtaining the proper medical care.

From that consistency of care, case development will follow; and for Federal and Postal employees seeking to obtain Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management under FERS, the proper time for filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application will come naturally as the case develops, which often needs the guidance and counsel of a FERS attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Federal & Postal Disability Retirement: Spam

If you remember eating it as a kid, it “dates” you — for, who in this day and age eats something that is singularly unhealthy, contains high levels of fats, calories and sodium, as well as unnamed preservatives?  On the other hand, the younger generation doesn’t blink an eye, and instead sees the word as a forgotten acronym for “junk email”, or otherwise known as “unsolicited commercial email”.

Are the two related?  Can there be a coincidence between a word which has two meanings or more, but contains some similarities and parallels?

Spam as a commercial yummy — oh, but of those memories when the can is first opened, of using that metal “key” where you insert the “thingie” and roll back the metal strip; and upon opening the can, the thick fat that surrounds in globs of hibernating hews of highlights hidden amidst the green shadows of delectable delights.  Spam as unsolicited commercial email — oh, but how that folder fills up so quickly, and yet do we nevertheless obsessively check each one “just in case” it was mistakenly misidentified and sent to the wrong folder?

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who cross over generational lines — of whether you remember the word as the delectable blob of pork making its popularity entrance sometime after WWII, or of the “new” generation who makes the connection to unsolicited commercial emails — if a medical condition begins to prevent you from performing one or more of the essential elements of your job, you may want to consider filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.

Spam is a reality of life; medical conditions, too, occur and become an unavoidable reality; and whether of either reality that uninvitedly intrudes upon your life, it the next step beyond that a person takes which is the important moment of actionable directions.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Federal Disability Retirement Representation: Private Hells

Wouldn’t a “hell” by definition encompass privacy and insularity?  For, isn’t one of the benefits of commiserating and “sharing” (in the modern parlance) that one expiates the pains and troubles one experiences?  Thus, if a hell is to be a hell, wouldn’t it be in seclusion and in solitary confinement for all eternity; otherwise, the hell described would be less than hell because it would be a lessened state of agony and torture and thus would not be the intended deterrent that such descriptive conclusions would be?

Private hells are the worse kinds of hells, if one were to place them on a spectrum of graduated scales.  It is the hell that cannot be shared with others; cannot be complained about; cannot be dissipated by describing, telling, delineating or implicitly requesting comforting words about; such constitute the worst of torture chambers left in the chaos of one’s mind.  The social animal — the “human being” — is one who derives strength, courage, determination and the will to live by engaging in the very thing that social animals do: talk; tell stories; share troubles; commiserate.

That is often the exponentially exacerbating effect of a medical condition being suffered by a Federal employee — of having to keep it a secret; not being able to be open about it; not sharing because he or she is unable to talk about it for fear of retaliation and the evils of bad intentions.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from such a state of private hell, it is time to begin to prepare, formulate and file for Federal Disability Retirement benefits, to be submitted and ultimately decided by the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset.

The private hell of one’s fears and anxieties concerning the entire administrative process of Federal Disability Retirement is often partly due to the strangeness of it all, and consulting with a lawyer who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law is often the first best step in extinguishing those flames of agony that are described in ancient scrolls, lest the private hells become public dungeons that flog the soul beyond what the law allows, which can clearly be explained and contained with a private consultation with legal counsel who can guide you out of that private hell by explaining the process of OPM Disability Retirement.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Medical Retirement under FERS & CSRS: This upside down world

How many whistleblowers would do it all over again?  How many regrets does it take to screw in a lightbulb?  The answer: Few as to the first question, and at least a dozen in response to the second.  For, as to the second query, while one person engages in the mechanical act of lighting up the room, it takes all of the others to fail to assuage the regrets of a person who has tried to do the rights thing, and has lived to suffer the consequences.

We grow up being taught all sorts of empty adages — how “truth reveals all”, or that “justice prevails in the end”; and though the old hero of simplicity has now been replaced by more “complex” characters of mixed good/bad/neutral, still the naïveté of childhood upbringings tend to haunt beyond the loss of innocence delayed.

This is an upside down world where the clear-cut demarcations that once were inviolable have now become obscured, and where leaders can argue with a straight face any and all positions, whether self-contradictory, hypocritical or just plain nonsense, and can get away with it without any regrets or loss of sleep.  Perhaps it has always been like that and we just didn’t realize it.  The wealthy have always been able to get away with more; the powerful, without much consequences; and when the combination of wealth and power become aggregated, there is little to impose any checks and balances that might have tempered the onslaught of injustice.

For the Federal employee and the U.S. Postal worker who suffers from a medical condition, where the medical condition begins to prevent the Federal or Postal worker from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal job, the fact that we live in an upside down world becomes exponentially the case because of the medical condition itself.

Progressive deterioration and chronic debilitation are often the rule of a medical condition, and just to survive another day without pain, without emotional or mental anguish — these are the hallmarks of needing to file for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset.

The world is about as topsy-turvy as it can get; but when the private world of one’s health begins to deteriorate, that upside down world becomes a tumultuous maze of a conundrum wrapped within an insanity that cannot be escaped from, and that is when you know that preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application becomes a necessity in a universe that requires some wisdom, and turning to the advice of an attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement is often the first step in providing a balanced perspective within this upside down world.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Medical Retirement under FERS & CSRS: Wants and needs

One often encounters such discussions, about the difference between “wants” and “needs”.  Needs are dictated by a loose definition of survival or existence — that which is required by or necessitated of the things which satisfy the criteria for continued existence or maintaining of a given modality of the status quo.  The other — “wants” — are defined as those “extras” that are not required for existence, but go beyond the prerequisite for survival and add to the comfort and meaningfulness of one’s very existence and survival.

There is always a grey area between the two when one engages anyone in a discussion involving the two — and it often depends upon the paradigm and perspective one takes, which leads to conclusions not only about the subject concerning wants and needs, but also about one’s own character, upbringing and attitude towards life in general.

Take the perspective of a member of the British Royal Family, for example — of a person who knows of existence entirely from the perspective of wealth, privilege and undiminished wants and needs.  Such a person will often have a widely differing view of the distinction between the two, in contradistinction to a person born in the ghettos of an inner city, whether here in the United States or of more underdeveloped countries elsewhere.

Can one who has never lacked for needs, or even of wants, recognize the objective criteria that determines the differences between the two?  In other words, can the poor person even have a logical discussion with a wealthy person by pointing out that food is an example of “need”, as opposed to a Ferrari being merely a “want”?  Or, will the member of the Royal Family retort with, “Well, yes, I can see how cheap caviar of a subpar quality could be a need as opposed to wanting a Rolls Royce.”

Such a response, of course, tells one immediately that there will be a difficult road ahead in attempting the bridge the gap between understanding, comprehension and the art of logic and discussion.  What we want, we often do not need; and what we need, we merely want for want of sufficiency.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who want to continue their careers despite a medical condition that prevents the Federal or Postal worker from performing all of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal job, preparing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, to be filed with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, will often cross the threshold between wants and needs.

You may want to extend your career, but need to end it because of your medical condition.  Your agency may want to be compassionate, but may need to follow directives from above.  You may want to remain, but need to depart.  The conflict between wants and needs is one of life’s ongoing clashes between the two, and preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, to be filed through OPM, may need to be initiated in order to satisfy the ultimate need of one’s existence: The need to want to look after one’s health.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

OPM Disability Retirement: Those intersecting connections

We hear all the time about the shrinking world, the smaller universe, the global village – all metaphors to help and understand, to comprehend and be able to withstand within the insanity of a world that continues to intrude, intersect and impose itself upon every corner and aspect of lives lived and daily interrupted.  It is a way for people to cope with the fact that we can no longer avoid the reality of those intersecting connections from worlds, cultures and universes that make up the daily reality of our walking lives.

The newspapers globalize each and every issue; the television and cable news outlets care little for local news unless it, too has some national consequences; and so we live with the anomaly that the only time you might hear about your own hometown is if some horrific event occurs that other people in other towns might care about.  And, even when a story is reported about an event that occurs just around the corner from the news station, headquarters or whatever manner of identifying the central place where all of the equipment, studios and personnel gather to emit their airwaves of newsfeeds, they act as if it is occurring in some distant county or country, with perhaps a bit of weeping as an afterthought with a statement like, “And it makes it all the worse because it happened just in our own neighborhood!”

The world is indeed one comprised of intersecting connections, and we voluntarily allow for those connections to make our own perspectives molded into “theirs” by inviting various cable channels into our living rooms.  Do we really have a choice?  Can we just remain ignorant and ignore the reality of the global economy, the extended village and the universal concerns of the day?  How do we live with the complexities of intersecting connections, when we can barely deal with the local problems that beset us within the cocoon of our own lives?

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, such that the medical condition begins to impact the daily ability and capacity to perform all of the essential elements of the Federal or Postal job, the microcosm of intersecting connections may well be magnified to a level where it competes with what is occurring on a more global scale.

Suddenly, the Federal Agency is moving to put pressure on you – like those competing foreign companies you hear about in the world economy.  Or, the Supervisor is no longer being cordial – somewhat like the world leader who doesn’t return calls to the President.  Coworkers no longer treat you as an equal – like nations that suddenly go rogue without explanation.  You have to file a complaint – like submitting to a U.N. vote for sanctions.

We have all been groomed and prepared to think in terms of intersecting connections, but for the Federal and Postal employee who suffers from a medical condition such that preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application becomes a necessity, it all comes back to a more local and personal connection: one’s health, and the need to focus upon one’s personal life.

No matter how global the world has become, never forget that it is the personal life of close connections that really only matters in the end.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Disability Retirement for Federal Workers: Of other’s misery

It may give one a sense of short-term satisfaction; sort of like Chinese carry-out, it satisfies for an hour or so, then seems to lose its efficacy for fulfillment.  Whereas, there are other foods that tend to last for greater time; and so it is with receiving news or information of other’s misery.  It certainly allows for a comparison of sorts; of tilting balances imagined, or even for contrasting accomplishments forsaken, dreams yet unfulfilled or misery unabated.

Of other’s misery – we condescend, conceal our delight and contend that we care and “feel terribly”; in other words, we sit and do nothing about it, even if we were able to.  Oh, we give the proper lip-service, of course: “How terrible”; “What a shame”; “What can one do?”  But all the while, inside, we whisper in soliloquys that harbor those feelings of secretive annoyances that say, “Thank goodness it is the other guy,” and begin to take an inventory of relief and comparative analysis of how best to take advantage of the situation.

Is that too cynical a viewpoint?  Does Machiavelli live within all of us?  Perhaps not to the extent described.  Then, what of other’s misery?  At a minimum, it provides a contrast and places us in a state of reality that says, Maybe our situation is not so bad after all.  Contentment by contrast of balancing the misery of others, however, is no way to live.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, such that the medical condition prevents the Federal or Postal employee from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal job, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, the key to preparing a successful and effective Federal Disability Retirement application to be submitted to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management is not by comparing the content of other’s misery, but by a direct creation of a nexus between one’s own medical condition and the essential elements of one’s position description.

Forget the instinctively wrong-headed approach of asking, “Well, does X-medical condition qualify if so-and-so had the same condition and was still able to work?” Or: “There are others more bad off than I am, so…”  So what?  Federal Disability Retirement is a specific legal basis that requires specificity as to individual circumstances.  It is irrelevant as to issues of other’s misery; it is one’s own that one must focus upon.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire