FERS Medical Retirement: The Divide Between Self and Reality

Despair often comes when the chasm between consciousness of self (as opposed to self-consciousness) and the reality which, upon even a moment’s pause, one realizes — goes beyond the divide of acceptability.

That is why the whole endeavor of “self-esteem” — which generally began sometime in the second and third generations after WWII’s fighting men came home and married and started families — was a delicate and consequential conundrum.  Yes, kids needed to have a positive self-esteem; however, the question was, how best to instill it?  Was self-esteem the substance for the thing itself, or was it a byproduct of one’s accomplishments?

Modern educators opted for the former; and that is why, today, Americans are first in self-esteem but last in knowledge.  For, when the divide between self and reality grows too expansive, the consequence is that we come to realize that we are empty shells, fabricators, and imposters within a world of reality.

Of course, we all fashion narratives which either leave out some negative history, or add to it in the best light possible.  The truth of a person described to others is mostly a hodgepodge of make-believe, and it is only when the unexpected visit from the cousin or other sibling refutes the historical narrative of fairytales told when that divide between self and reality comes to the fore.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition such that the medical condition prevents the Federal or Postal worker from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal job, the divide between self and reality is told thus: “My medical conditions are not that serious; I can just quietly ignore it and continue on.”  But then, the day comes when the divide between the narrative told and the reality foretold grows too expansive.

That is the time to contact a FERS Disability Lawyer who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law, and begin to initiate the process of preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal or Postal Disability Retirement application under the FERS system, which will hopefully close that chasm of the growing divide between self and reality.

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 Law: The Finish Line

What is there, at that end which you strived so hard to reach?  We often confuse the end-goals and mix up the purposes engaged.  What is the purpose of the finish line?  Is it merely to reach and cross it?  Does a runner engage in the activity merely to cross the finish line, or is there a greater purpose beyond the mere crossing?

Certainly, for an alien from another planet — or even to a child where explanations have not yet been sufficiently comprehensible because of a lack of context and he or she is merely an accidental spectator not yet attuned to the “ways of the world” — watching men and women strain and struggle to reach a white line and collapse upon crossing it, is a specter of strangeness and peculiarity.

Was it for the health benefits of jogging and running?  Was it to win a prize — a ribbon, a trophy, some cash?  Or was it merely for the fun of competition — to train, to discipline, to achieve?  And what of metaphorical finish lines?

The “race of life”, the “marathon to achieve”, etc. — you know, the motivational constructs which allegedly compel us to greater heights of competitive highs.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who retain an image of a “finish line” — of reaching those magical numbers which declare to everyone, “I have made it!” — it may be that other factors intercede, interrupt and prevent you from achieving that goal of being able to cross that proverbial “finish line”.

What would be the point if, upon reaching the finish line, you collapse and die?  Or, end up in a wheelchair, debilitated and unable to enjoy those “golden years”?

People often mix up and confuse the purpose for the goal with the crossing of the finish line itself: Reaching the finish line is not the same as answering the “why” of getting there.  If your health is deteriorating and you are only destroying yourself in the very effort to reach that finish line, it is time to consider preparing, formulating and filing an effective OPM Disability Retirement application under FERS.

And yes, while being on Federal Disability Retirement, those years you are on it count towards your total number of years of Federal Service when it is recalculated at age 62, so that you are essentially building up your retirement systems while being on Federal Disability Retirement.

Contact a FERS Attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law, and consider what the options are so that you don’t confuse and conflate reaching the finish line for the greater purpose of why and how you want to get there.

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.

 

FERS Employees Medical Retirement from the OPM: The Insatiable Appetite

This is a world which possesses it; each species is driven by it; the human experience confirms it.  The insatiable appetite is one which wants more, craves more, and is never satisfied.  Technology hints at it; and when Plato discusses the need for a balanced soul, whereby the rational part must govern the appetitive, he understood the nature of the extreme.

We may give lip service to our desire to live a more contemplative, laid-back life, but the plain fact is that the combination of unfettered capitalism and loss of societal boundaries naturally results in the insatiable appetite — of greater stimulation in video formats; of wealth beyond what a single person can consume; of a national debt which cannot have a ceiling; of brutality in war that has no humanity, etc.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition such that the medical condition “slows down” the pace of life — by necessity, because there is a natural limit as to what the human body and mind can take — filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits under FERS is an acknowledgment that there is a cost to the insatiable appetite.

We cannot go on forever at the frenetic pace which life attempts to force upon us, and instead, we are left with making certain critical decisions: Is the cost of my health worth the job I have?

Contact a disability attorney to discuss the possibility of filing an effective OPM Disability Retirement application under FERS, and begin considering whether the insatiable appetite can at least be confined to the cages of medieval moats and dungeons of the past.

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.

 

Postal and Federal Employee Disability Retirement: Progressive Deterioration

We witness it in others — in our parents; in ourselves, we “feel” it more than see it, as we don’t visually view ourselves in the mirror or observe our own reflections as a third party; and in a community, sometimes we are witness to either ends of the spectrum — of the slow crumbling and abandonment or the “gentrification” of a neighborhood; and in the greater society, the progressive deterioration, of a loss of commonality and retraction of civil behavior, etc.

Progressive deterioration is also how a medical condition “works” — of an incremental, almost imperceptible loss of function, lessening of efficacy, regression of capacity.  Then, there comes a point where such loss no longer allows a person to perform in the same manner as he or she once was capable of.  People compensate in various ways to overcome such deterioration, almost always, however, at a further cost to one’s body or mind.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition such that the medical condition has reached a point where the progressive deterioration no longer allows you to perform one or more of the essential functions of your position, contact a disability attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement and consider the option of leaving that phase of your career behind, and moving forward to apply those other functions in a different capacity.

Progressive deterioration is rarely one of complete devastation; not of totality, but of partial loss and lessening.

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.

 

OPM Disability Retirement: Seriousness in a time of folly

The young are expected to engage in folly; middle age, of some peripheral insight; the old, of wisdom finally gained; and of deathbed conversions, a last gasp of regrets untold.

The imbalances in a world turned topsy-turvy impede upon an ordered universe: Today, the young are idolized and youth is the new god of sunlight; the middle-aged engage in nostalgia before their time, constantly striving to regain that which was lost by a mere filament of grey, and begin telling untruths about one’s age, shaving a year here, getting a botox injection merely to flatten the crease of a smile’s delay; and the aged are shuttered in corners where irrelevance was merely an afterthought, in roomful of arms outstretched in hopes that yoga will prolong the agony of an uncertain afterlife.

This is an age which has been deemed the “Cult of the Youth”, but more than that, where seriousness can scantily be found in this time of folly.  We merely talk a lot.  Our grandfathers once gave us the tidbit of wisdom: Talk is cheap.  Yet, in this age of seriousness lost in a time of folly, we continue to merely talk especially because the price of doing something beyond talk is too great a burden to bear.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition such that the medical condition no longer allows the Federal or Postal worker to continue in one’s chosen career with the Federal Agency or the Postal Service, it is time to consider seriousness in a time of folly. The “folly” is the notion that things can continue as they have before; the “seriousness” is the decision to come to the realization that change is necessary and must now come about.  The further question is: What form does the change come in, and how does one go about it?

Federal Disability Retirement is a benefit which should be considered when the folly overtakes and the seriousness must be faced.  It is a long and arduous administrative process, full of bureaucratic pitfalls, and consultation and guidance by an experienced Attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law is a first step towards recognizing that seriousness in a time of folly is a consideration to embrace for a future yet uncertain.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire
OPM Disability Retirement Lawyer

 

Medical Retirement under FERS & CSRS: The “rush” job

There is a difference, of course, between a “rush” job and a “sloppy” one; and while the two can be one and the same, there are circumstances where the former is necessary but does not necessarily have to result in the latter.

Procrastination is often the harbinger of sloppiness, and having to “rush” at the last minute is normally a natural and inevitable consequence of it.  Most events, issues and problems arising in life are never real emergencies; we make of them so because we allow them to fester and grow, like those molds left in petri dishes once reserved for science experiments that become fodder for science fiction novellas.

Medical conditions have a way of adding to complexities and delaying circumstances otherwise traveling on a normal course of events; things just tend to “pile up” like dishes first left in the sink, then another few, until suddenly one realizes that the stack that began with a single unwashed plate is now a tottering semblance of the Leaning Tower of Pisa, and another emergency to attend to.

Suddenly, everything needs to be done yesterday; and what was once something that needed to be done sometime in the obscure future, demands attention today, yesterday and the day before that.  What one does not know, or is not aware of, of course, is often ignored, and deliciously cast aside — for ignorance is bliss and not recognizing what is slowly evolving in the dark corners of the unreachable abyss, though harmful, is better left unknown.  Or so we think.  Wrongly, as it turns out.

Like medical conditions left undiagnosed, we go through life happily ignorant; or like actions of a Federal Agency while the Federal or Postal employee is taking too much time off to go to medical appointments or trying to get better — is it better not to know what supervisors and managers are discussing behind one’s back?

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who have waited and waited, hoping that one’s medical condition will get better, will somewhat improve, or otherwise disappear altogether, and who have now exhausted all SL, AL and the patience of the Agency or Postal Facility in taking LWOP, perhaps a PIP is in sight, or the “end” is nigh and an adversarial action is “in the works”; or, perhaps none of that is but a faraway matter to be concerned with.

Whatever the circumstances, life brings about emergencies, and maybe even triggers a “rush” job; but always remember that the end-focus is to prepare, formulate and file an effective and persuasive Federal Disability Retirement application, to be filed with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, and the “rush” job that is suddenly an emergency needs to be tempered by excellence, lest sloppiness hinders the efficacy of rushing that which is important for one’s future.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Federal Disability Retirement: And then we are gone…

The trailing ellipsis establishes a pause for reflection, and the finality of three periods for an emphasis upon the irreversible nature of the statement.  “And then” connotes that something preceded – a lifetime of activities, a century or less of human historicity involving birth, growth, work, struggles, etc. – existed before the conclusion of the life.

The “we are” slice of the sentence implies two additional variables: the universality of involvement – an event that excludes no one – and the present tense of that which is inevitable.  And what about the final word before the ellipsis?  The eternal nothingness; the inescapable conclusion to every novel, every short story, every figure of historical significance or otherwise; we all die.

We somehow try and escape or avoid that fate.  Heidegger’s observation that the whole of human activity is merely a project of distraction and avoidance – that we perform this busy-ness and that all-consuming work or hobby, not because it is inevitable, important, relevant or even interesting, but because to do nothing would be to face the reality of our own demise daily.

Perhaps that is somewhat of an overstatement.  And yet… In the end, plastic surgery, herbal teas and strenuous exercise may only prolong the terminal exit ramp for a fortnight or even a calendric cycle or two, but it is the “in-between” times that make all the difference in a person’s life.  And what of quality?  Does quantification by pure duration determine the worthiness of that “in-between” period, or is it better to have lived a short but “full” life, before the finality of nothingness comes upon one?

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who are suffering from a medical condition, such that the medical condition is making that preceding period before the universalization of finality becoming a reality “less than worthwhile”, the time may have approached, and perhaps even passed, that preparing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application has become not merely a necessity but a crisis of mandate.

Sometimes, in life, the choices are limited and the options presented somewhat less than the best of life’s offerings; yet, to live out that duration of what is future-oriented by enduring pain, suffering and illness in an atmosphere of hostility and adversarial contrariness for the remainder of the days yet to come, often become unbearable and unthinkable.

Filing 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, is often the only solution to a problem unsolvable. It is that moment before the part that goes, “And then…”, where the ellipsis has not yet reached the “we are” portion, and thus a crucial section of a life still to be lived.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Medical Retirement from Federal Government Employment: Parting grace in silence

Does grace extend even when the intended recipient is unaware of its attachment?  Can the undeclared withdrawal of revenge justified have its own inherent rewards, without the unsolicited admission left silent by anonymity undaunted?  If given the choice between leaving the scene where injustice prevailed and dominated – of wreaking revenge or parting grace in silence – which would we choose?

Of course, there is a greater contextual awakening to be narrated before such an event would occur – of quietly enduring the daily harassment, the constant criticism and demeaning remarks; of refuting, rebutting and reacting, as against an agency that initiates adverse actions one after another in sequential persistence of unfettered meanness.

From that erupts the natural tendency in thinking:  “They can’t get away with this”; or, “If I have to spend my last dime, I am going to get even with them.”  Yet, is the cost of revenge worth the time, effort and expenditures depleted?  What does it mean to attain “justice” in an unjust world?  If a verdict is rendered or a settlement reached, what is the barometer by which one has regained one’s reputation, reestablished that one was ‘right’ or recuperated the toil of anguish and angst expended?

Filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal employee or U.S. Postal worker is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, is not a surrender of one’s soul to an agency that has not, will not or otherwise cannot accommodate one’s medical conditions.  Rather, it is an admission that there exists an incommensurability between the particular position occupied and the medical conditions suffered.

That is the point made in the case of Henderson v. OPM, in which the U.S. Merit Systems Protection Board reiterated the alternative but equally valid approach in proving a Federal Disability Retirement case by a preponderance of the evidence:  a 1-to-1 ratio between a medical condition and an essential element of one’s Federal or Postal position is not the only methodology in establish a medical condition such that the Federal or Postal employee becomes eligible and entitled to Federal Disability Retirement benefits, but additionally, a showing that there is an incompatibility generally between the position occupied and the medical conditions suffered is also a basis for granting a Federal Disability Retirement benefit.

Whatever workplace issues have been a part of the content and context of a Federal or Postal employee needing to file for Federal Disability Retirement benefits, once that decision is made to prepare, formulate and file for Federal Disability Retirement, one might consider this:  The past has passed; the present must be endured while waiting upon a decision by OPM; the future is based upon the decision of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management; and in the meantime, where do you want to expend your energies?  You may want to consider parting grace in silence, instead of spinning the proverbial wheels heaping reactive acts of futile counterpunches upon those who know not the terms of justice.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire