Legal Representation on Federal Disability Retirement Claims: Joy and trials

It is the defining of life itself; of the spectrum across a wide range of peaks, valleys, proverbial mountaintops and chasms of tumults like a groan beneath the terrain of the earth.  We attempt to avoid the latter and quantitatively expand the former, thinking that if we fill our experiences with joy, the trials will be lessened or the impact less eventful.

There are gauges of summer, the plateau of fall; we sense the discontent of winter and the exhilaration of spring; and like the subtle pull of the orbs afar that impact the tides and moons of horses galloping in the night, the shudder of sensations unfelt and the future yet untold make anxious of us all.

Joy is the experience of human beings; trials, the objective world impinging upon the subjectivity of our daily refrain.  Can we even have one without the other?

We posit fictional hypotheticals that probably never were; of Rousseau’s “State of Nature” where savages roamed in scant loincloths without a care in the world; and of paradise lost like Milton’s foreboding of a utopia now crumbling into the dystopian paragon of untruths and Orwell’s misinformation where totalitarianism becomes the choice of self-immolation.

As Being cannot mean anything without its opposite, Nothingness, so is it not the trials of life that magnify and make relevant the joy felt on any given day?  Can one truly exist without the other?

And yet we attempt to minimize and diminish the latter in thinking that we deserve the former.  But as the inane philosopher now long forgotten once stated with annoyance and greater impertinence, “It is what it is”.  Whatever that means.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who are experiencing the “trials” period of one’s life because of a medical condition that prevents the Federal or Postal worker from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal job, the attempt to jump over and across the great divide so that one can get back to the “joy” part of life’s offerings by trying to “work with” the Federal agency or Postal service, or to “seek an accommodation” with one’s Federal department or Postal facility, there is another proverbial adage that comes to mind: “Banging one’s head up against the wall.”

It is often the case, unfortunately, that in order to get from the “trials” to the “joy” part of life, the Federal or Postal employee will have to prepare, formulate and file an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, to be filed with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee wants to or not.

For, in the end, the truth of the matter is, the “trials” part of life is something you have little or no control over – such as a medical condition; it is only the “joy” part of the deal that you can assert some dominance over: by taking the affirmative steps to file an OPM Disability Retirement application.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Federal Disability Retirement: Compartmentalizing

It may well be another evolutionary vestige to have the capacity to divide, separate, pigeonhole and compartmentalize; otherwise, the extreme bombardment of visual and auditory stimuli would be overwhelming, and perhaps untenable to one’s ability to process the volume and extent of the information needed to receive, analyze and comprehend.

What is relevant; what must be immediately attended and responded to; which sets can be procrastinated; where does this bit of data go to?  In this world of information technology, perhaps the human animal is best suited to amass and bifurcate into seamless paradigms of perceptual pinholes for proper processing.  But, of course, as with all things advantageous, there are elements of negative consequences.

For those who have limited capacity to effectively engage in such endeavors; and for those who suffer from medical conditions which limit and reduce such capacity.  Medical conditions tend to lower the tolerance for stress; and in this world of fast-paced technology, there is little room for empathy for those who cannot maintain the maddening spectrum of timeless busy-ness.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, such that the medical condition begins to impact one’s ability and capacity to perform the essential elements of one’s job, the inability to withstand the level of stress is often the turning point of making the proper decision in preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal worker is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset.

Some may whisper that he or she is no longer able to “hack it” in the real world; others may simply sneer or snicker with purposeless pride of pernicious penchant for punishing pointedness.  But the reality is that there is almost always an intimate connection between stress, the capacity to tolerate stress, and health.

Health involves man’s ability to compartmentalize; and whether through the evolutionary mechanism of survival of the fittest, where those who became best at separating the relevant from the unimportant; or just because those who are able to bifurcate and comprehend happen to parallel the course of history in developing the complexities of the information age; whatever the reasons, the time of ultimate compartmentalizing comes in the self-recognition that it may be necessary to identify the source of one’s deteriorating health, and to allow that to be the impetus and compelling reason to begin the process of preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through OPM.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Medical Retirement Benefits for US Government Employees: Footprints

This winter, inclement weather has befallen us with a vengeance.  Snow remains on the ground, upon ice, upon frozen ground; and more is expected.  Under such circumstances, footprints of unidentified creatures traversing the loneliness of the dead of night are left behind.  Some, we quickly dismiss as representing a known animal; others, one is less sure of.  They tell us of their presence the previous evening or nightfall, after everyone is tucked away and the dog went out for her last run.  They reveal to us that things occur even in the absence of our presence.

We often fail to realize that life continues on a linear path despite our exit from a particular place, scene, or the world at large.  Whether in gradual dissipation from everyday presence to sporadic appearances, or a sudden and immediate departure with never a return, the rest of the scene continues on, and life and livelihoods proceed on a progressive path of history.  What footprints we left behind may remain as an impression for a day, a week, or perhaps longer; but never for eternity.  It is always difficult to depart from the daily course of patterned lives.

For the Federal and Postal Worker who has been regularly involved in the daily operations of an agency, a department, etc., with interactions with supervisors, coworkers, and multiple others just by appearing and being there each day, the pattern interrupted by a medical condition is a devastation beyond words.  Federal Disability Retirement is not something which Federal and Postal Workers want to pursue; it is, instead, a benefit which is applied for through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, most often with hesitation, trepidation, and as a last resort.

Remembrances of footprints are not what lives are lived for; rather, it is the impressions left behind by those who have toiled hard to the very end, and who are remembered for their humanity, that makes all the difference in the world.

For Federal and Postal Workers who have left such a mark, those footprints remain in the minds of those who cared.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

FERS & CSRS Disability Retirement for Federal and USPS Workers: Unfolding versus Unraveling

Does one’s life unfold, as expectations become satisfied and met; as plans come to fruition; and as the future one prepared for remains on a steady course of purposeful direction?

Or is it merely an unraveling, where an artificial semblance of having it “all together” was merely a brave front; where behind closed doors the chaos of one’s life was veiled in hidden secrecy; and of the chasm between the public persona presented and the private life grew ever increasingly disconnected and wider with each growing month, year, and decade, such that the mirror reflected one day resembled nothing like the person you once knew?

Rarely does life unfold like a gift neatly packaged for presentation at a special ceremony; but, similarly, neither should it unravel in an instant merely because of an unexpected twist of fate.

Medical conditions, unfortunately, often test the integrity of one’s life.  Because medical conditions pervade all aspects of one’s life — from testing personal loyalties, family and friends, to seeing how far sympathies will extend; to how one’s work, supervisors and coworkers react; whether the future unfolds well or unravels suddenly, is often revealed during such times of crisis management.

For Federal and Postal employees who are under FERS or CSRS, preparing one’s course and direction for the future when confronting a medical condition should involve consideration in filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.

While the administrative process can be a long and arduous one, securing one’s future will help in the process of unfolding one’s life, and preventing it from unraveling.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

Federal Disability Retirement: This Side, or the Other, of Paradise

It represents that mythical existence — whether in a physical sense, or a metaphysical state of being — where harmony, the absence of pain and a continuum of pleasure and contentment are experienced daily and in sustained fashion.  Perhaps it is a fictional creation propelled by those who have known the negative of that which has been formulated.

Ultimately, it is the place to which we strive, and whether we arrive just on the other side of paradise, or on this side, is the criteria which society judges as to the success or failure of a given life.  And who is the judge, and what right to render such a judgment?  One’s own assessment, and the insular world of one’s psyche, may well be enough for most; but that often merely involves the sleight of words, of redefining what words mean, in order to fit the conceptual construct which others have proposed.

For the Federal and Postal Worker who suffers from a medical condition, such that he or she must contemplate filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management under FERS or CSRS, the capacity to attain a level of restorative quietude through relief from daily activities, may well be enough to constitute a state of paradise.

It is amazing how the threshold of meanings and goals to achieve are lowered considerably when one experiences pain or psychological turmoil and hurt.  Only those who have never experienced a medical condition fail to know what it means to be caught in the proverbial web of medical necessity.

For the Postal Worker and the Federal employee whose lives are shaken by a medical condition, whether it is physical pain or cognitive dysfunction, or both, the difference between landing on this side of paradise, or on the other side, is often determined by whether one gets Federal Disability Retirement benefits or not, and whether the period of rest and restorative state of being is attainable by securing one’s future stability and sense of peace.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

Early Medical Retirement for Disabled Federal Workers: Joy of the Mundane, Though We Knew It Not

The very concepts of “joy” and “mundane”, placed within the same breath, the same sentence, creates what is tantamount to an anomaly, a self-contradiction, an oxymoron, or at the very least a questionable positing of an invalid proposition.

For we tend to consider joy in terms of momentary elation, an extended period of satisfaction, or a sense of quietude wrapped in layers of giggling quivers.  Conversely, the mundane evokes boredom, monotony, a time devoid of elevated emotional responses; a time of negation, where the chasm between desire and duty floats apart from one another like drifting icebergs in the cold North Atlantic seas.

Until a medical condition intervenes.  Until the chronicity of a progressively deteriorating and debilitating disease or injury eats away at our body, mind and/or soul.

In a crisis, the monotony of the mundane becomes preferable; and in a protracted life of chronic ailments, that momentary period of quietude when life was merely the ordinary and the boredom of everyday existence prevailed upon a life questioned as to value, purpose, character and the eternal “why?”; it is then that one comes to realize the ultimate Zen character of enlightenment, and recognizes the living distinction between joy and the mundane.

For the Federal and Postal worker who suffers daily, Federal Disability Retirement is a viable alternative to the daily divide which has grown disproportionately magnified, between joy and the mundane.

Federal Disability Retirement benefits are part of one’s bundle of employment benefits.  It is a benefit filed through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, for those under either FERS or CSRS, and allows for early medical retirement, while tending to one’s health conditions.

We all once knew the joy of the mundane; but such knowledge quickly gets erased when a medical condition creates a crisis.  Federal Disability Retirement allows the Federal and Postal employee to relive that joy — of the mundane, the monotonous, of the everyday existence of the ordinary which we all seek and desire.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

FERS & CSRS Disability Retirement for Federal and USPS Workers: And Beyond…

Can you remember a time of health?  A time in the past when you were pain-free, able to have the cognitive acuity to focus, concentrate, and attend to the details of a task?  A time past is a reminder of the potentiality of a time-future.

In preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether under FERS or CSRS, the central point of the administrative process should always be kept in mind:  to reach a point in life where one can have a recuperative period of rest, restorative time, and multiple days beyond pain and ill health.  But just as the “gestalt” moment in a psychological awakening is not the end of the story, but merely a slice of life in a greater context of historicity, so the various events of the administrative process in preparing, formulating, filing, and finally obtaining Federal Disability Retirement benefits from OPM is not the end of the narrative for the Federal or Postal employee seeking to obtain Federal Disability Retirement benefits.

There is life beyond; as such, obtaining an approval of a Federal Disability Retirement application is merely the beginning of the next step, and not the “end” of anything.  An approval from OPM is a goal worth achieving; but such a goal is merely an intermediate step in a greater cause:  of attaining a state of health, somewhat like the “former” self of yesteryears; of planning for a brighter future in a second vocation; and to be able to enjoy one’s family, friends, and the circle of those closest and most important:  those who have been loyal, even when loyalty revealed a disappointment in those whom you depended upon, and thought you could depend upon.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

Medical Retirement for Federal Workers: Moving Beyond

Once a decision has been made to begin preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits under FERS & CSRS, then the mechanical aspects of gathering and compiling the evidence to make one’s paper presentation to the Office of Personnel Management must begin.

It can be a daunting process.  However, it is overcoming the initial timidity which is the first step.  The compilation of the proper medical narrative reports with the effective wording and nexus between the medical condition and essential elements of one’s job; the creation of a narrative word picture of one’s Applicant’s Statement of Disability; any legal arguments to be presented and cited; the remainder of the Standard Forms to be completed by the Agency; the insurance forms — one can easily get lost in the morass of such paperwork.  

Then, there is the “waiting period” — that long and anxiety-stricken time of waiting for the Office of Personnel Management to makes its decision at the Initial Stage, and if denied, at the Reconsideration Stage of the process; and, if denied a second time, an appeal to the Merit Systems Protection Board.  

It is during the “waiting period” that one must begin to think about the period “beyond” — that time when one becomes a Federal Disability Retiree, where one finally has the proper time to attend to one’s medical conditions, then to rethink in terms of another job, another career, another phase of life.  It is the time to think about “moving beyond” one’s self-perception and paradigm of self-conception of being a “Federal employee”, and instead to think of the re-created self in new and fresh terms.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

CSRS & FERS Disability Retirement: Recognition

People who are considering filing for disability retirement benefits under FERS & CSRS often come to a recognition that there is life after the Federal Government, right around Thanksgiving, Christmas, and the holiday period in between.  Why?  Because when family, friends and loved ones gather around, and there is some time to recuperate and rejuvenate from the daily grind which further exacerbates and worsens one’s medical conditions, the time of respite, the time of peace and quite, of reflection and time reserved away from work, allows for people to recognize that, Yes, there is life beyond the job, and second, that to continue the daily grind until retirement may result in the inability of one to enjoy one’s retirement in later years.  Good health is a gift; all too often, we misuse that gift.  Happy Thanksgiving to all, and please enjoy a safe holiday weekend.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire