Medical Retirement for Federal Employees: Rushing a Case

“Penny wise, Pound foolish” is an adage which has struck around, for it goes to the heart of the matter: One skimps at the beginning but must then pay a hefty price in the end.  Rushing something is tantamount to the same idea — and while it may not cost one in terms of money, it does so in terms of time.

Often, the best things in life take time to mature, to develop, to formulate.  While there are certainly times when putting together something is a necessity (such as when the statute of limitations is approaching quickly), most other and ordinary times require the slow, methodical and systematic approach of developing properly, formulating meticulously and creating intricately the process in which one is engaged.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who need to file for Federal Disability Retirement benefits under FERS, contact an attorney to discuss developing and formulating one’s strategy, substance of the case, and the initiation of the legal methodology so that “rushing a case” is never an issue.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

OPM Disability Retirement for Federal Employees: “There Is a Time For…”

Whether religious or not, most are familiar with the general passages from Ecclesiastes.  In the Old King James Version, the poetic refrain; the beautiful cadence; the self-evident and comforting idea that the “rightness” of something and the perfection of “fitting” occurs under the heavens; that, somehow fate is already determined and we need to simply become attuned to the changes in our lives.

When there is a discordance between what we are doing and how the objective world is responding to our actions — that is when a sense of unrest occurs.  The old adages can pile up: Trying to fit a square peg into a round hole; failing to hit the nail on its head; kicking against the goads, etc.  Somehow, we all know about being a misfit in life.

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, it is important to recognize that there is a time for change.

Federal Disability Retirement benefits may be that change required by your particular circumstances, at this particular time, within the uniqueness of your situation.  While not as poetically stated as in the King James Version, consider consulting with an OPM Disability Attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Early OPM Retirement for Medical Incapacity: The many tomorrows yet to come

Does hope lie fallow when the basket of tomorrows become numbered too few?  When endless tomorrows lay before one’s imagination, too numerous to count that one need not bother, does that purport to show that one has a great quantity of hope, or merely that youth’s folly allows for a carefree tomorrow where an eternity of tomorrows can never be reduced to a handful beyond a few todays?  Can time and incremental portions of divided moments be quantified in that manner?

That has always been an anomaly for the undersigned writer — the quantification of time, as in the manner that religious beliefs are scoffed at when it comes to the story of genesis.  For, those who hold to the strict construction and literal meaning of the timeline of how old the earth is, count the obscure generational extensions of people who lived in former times, and somehow declare that the world is X-amount of years old.  How one can calculate with precision that which is not explicitly stated is a conundrum in and of itself, leaving aside the issue of whether time can be quantified if the order of the planetary system and our specific galactic orbit had not yet been established.

Evolutionists, of course, contend that the world was clearly created billions of years ago.  To both, the question is:  Tell me the logical difference between the following 2 statements — 1. The world was created a long time ago, and 2. The world was created billions of years ago.  Do humans have the capacity to imagine time beyond the present moment, or perhaps yesterday or a couple of days ago?  What does it mean to say to a person, “A type of human being walked the earth 10 million years ago”?  One can barely remember where one has placed the screwdriver used last week, and yet people want to put some significance upon a belief-system that purports to quantify time.

Ultimately, the question of whether one believes that the earth is a mere 10,000 years old, or billions of years in the making, is not a factual or scientific one; it is, a political condemnation that categorizes a person’s religious belief into a bifurcated system of: Is he/she “scientific” or “religious”?  In the end, time cannot be so easily quantified; rather, it is a basis of hope and an anticipation of a future yet to be resolved.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, such that the medical condition prevents the Federal and Postal worker from performing one or more of the essential elements of the Federal position, time often becomes paralyzed, much like our imagined world of dinosaurs and prehistoric images of those Pleistocene eras and beyond; and as time is unable to be made meaningful except in the here and now — by imagining the many tomorrows yet to come — preparing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application that lets you project a life beyond the present-day circumstances of pain, medical conditions and deteriorating health, is the singular differentiating way that humans can separate themselves from other species: with hope.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Federal & Postal Disability Lawyer: Reality, perspective & medical condition

Reality is the existence of Being; perspective, the Kantian structures of how we see things; and a medical condition is that intervening, interrupting and corroding event that may render the first and second of this tripartite concept into a skewering of prospects.

Of course, a medical condition impacts the reality of a situation, especially a person’s ability, capacity and initiative towards a goal, and further, one’s perspective may become completely altered as a result of the event –priorities may change, the goals one has may be pared back, and even the enthusiasm towards certain things may become modified.  That is why a medical condition is sometimes considered a “game changer” in the reality and perspective of one’s life.

Life is full of bumps and bridges; of trespasses and rightful directions; and even of encounters with empathy, love and kindness; and though the reality of one’s situation may often appear that any perspective other than one seen through the eyes of meanness, cruelty and hardened hearts is merely a child’s dream of a fantasyland long passed and forever extinguished, there are still times of joy to look forward to, moments of smiles and days of sunshine left.

A medical condition is often a dark cloud, but a proper perspective on the reality of that darkness needs to be gathered.

For the Federal employee and U.S. Postal worker who sees nothing but turmoil, disaster and progressive deterioration because of the medical condition that prevents the Federal or Postal worker from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s job, 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, may lend the Federal or Postal employee a different perspective on the reality of one’s situation.

No, filing an OPM Disability Retirement application will not be the answer to all of reality’s problems, but it may change one’s perspective as to the dark cloud that has gathered upon the reality of that medical condition that won’t seem to go away.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Medical Retirement from Federal Employment: Living beyond chance

Perhaps we engaged in it as children: making sure to skip over the jagged cracks in the sidewalk; turning suddenly in the opposite direction, believing that fate and determinism would be defied if an unexpected act were to be embraced; and later, the purchase of a lottery ticket, or to become more seriously addicted to gambling.

Chance provides the thrill of the unknown; but it need not rise to the level of daily obsessions in order to be caught in the delicate web of its enchantments; indeed, in fantasizing daily for circumstances to alter, becoming lost in daydreams of living a different life, or imagining subconsciously of occupying another, we surrender ourselves to the nirvana of chance and the enticement of make-believe, leaving us forever in the neutral rut of illicit anticipations never to be realized.

But problems rarely just go away on their own; and no matter what the chances are that fate and karma coincide to provide alternate universes of better circumstances, it is ultimately the affirmative will of the individual which makes the difference before the now and the moment thereafter.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, such that the medical condition prevents one from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal job, the intransigent situation of waiting for the Federal agency or the U.S. Postal Service to “act” in either accommodating the Federal or Postal employee’s medical condition, or to otherwise do something positive to resolve a hostile work environment ongoing because of the medical condition and the deterioration of one’s health, is to leave one’s circumstances to the winds of chance.

It must be by the affirmative steps taken by the Federal or Postal employee, to force the issue, and begin the process of preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal OPM Disability Retirement application, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, that “things” actually happen.

The fickleness of chance should be left behind, like childhood notions of gnomes hiding behind green hamlets of dream-filled universes; for the ugliness of the adult’s world requires us to live beyond chance, and the future depends upon awakening from that warm and cozy slumber of fate determined by avoidance.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

OPM Medical Retirement: The Deeper Recesses of Unwanted Caricatures

Caricatures often depict an exaggerated degree of undesirable characteristics, whether for comic effect or sleaze of meanness.  The totality of the person or entity described is rarely the reality of the grotesque aggregate of the negative characteristics, but one can still see the relative truth of validation in the aspects shown.

Such caricatures, too, can be either internal or external; the latter being the depiction from the perspective of someone “other”; the former comprised of the totality of one’s self-image, how one projects from the perspective of the other, and the reflective thoughts of one’s self.  When others describe one in caricature form, you may laugh, but inwardly shy with horror and fright; and in the deeper recesses of one’s privacy, the truth and impact of such unwanted caricatures may pull one into a psychological chasm of despair.

Medical conditions, especially, can exacerbate an already-existent fear and loathing, precisely because they attack and undermine those areas of the physical, emotional and psychological vulnerabilities most open and revealing.

For the Federal employee and the U.S. Postal worker who becomes impacted by a medical condition, such that the medical condition prevents one from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s positional duties, the unwanted caricatures which frighten and demean are often twofold:  Loss of productivity (resulting in reduction of income), and devaluing of self-worth, both in the eyes of coworkers as well as from the deeper recesses of one’s own perspective.

Filing for Federal Disability Retirement may not seem like the perfect solution in dealing with a medical condition, but as this is not an infallible universe, so we must accept the imperfections offered.

The generous parameters promulgated within the legal regulations of obtaining a Federal Disability Retirement, allows for the Federal and Postal worker to entertain a second vocation or career beyond the Federal Disability Retirement annuity (one may earn income in the private sector, up to 80% of what one’s former Federal or Postal salary was, in addition to the Federal Disability Retirement annuity).  More importantly, it allows for the Federal or Postal worker to first and foremost focus upon attending to the medical condition itself, while receiving a base annuity during the crisis point in determining the course of future actions.

Unfortunately, what often holds us back in securing one’s future is not the actual realities of an imperfect universe, but rather, the deeper recesses of one’s perfect world, as depicted in an unrealistic caricature within one’s own imagination, precluding progress where pantomimes may perform.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire
FERS Disability Retirement Attorney

 

Federal & Postal Disability Retirement Lawyer: Figures Larger than Life

Once, mythological figures and characters looming larger than life itself wandered amidst the common populace of everyday working folks; their very presence bestowed a greater sense of purpose, of a pride in knowing that better days lay ahead, and that even in the upheavals of tempestuous travails and turmoils which interrupted every economy and fiefdom because of the inevitable vicissitudes of economic activity, that somehow we would all survive through the common efforts of community.  But the pureness of the mountain stream became poisoned, diluted and polluted by egomaniacal intrusions of selfish constructs; “we” did not matter much, if at all, and the accolades of accretion demanded greater self-congratulatory spotlights of self-centered egoism.

Thus was the “selfie” born.  In the midst of such a society, empathy for the disabled will be wanting and rare; the saying that he would shove his own grandmother under a moving bus is not merely a warning, but a confirmation of normative character.  For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, such that the medical condition prevents one from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s job, it is well to know who, and what, one is dealing with.

Agencies and Post Offices which may have shown care and comaraderie during better times, may not continue the surface-appearance of comity and cooperation when it becomes clear that the Federal or Postal employee can no longer remain as fully productive as in years past.  Human nature being what it is, the self-contradiction of man’s thought processes can always amaze and delude:  One believes that one is neither naive nor ignorant; concomitantly, that the world is generally an evil arena of life; but, somehow, one’s own friends, family, and agency are the exception, when the callous experiences of life have shown us otherwise.

Filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits by the Federal employee or the U.S. Postal worker, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, is a clear indication to one’s agency or the U.S. Postal Service that you are no longer “one of us”, and more to the point, can no longer contribute to the betterment of the agency, the Postal Service, or to the advancement of management’s careers and objectives.

You become considered as mere dead weight and fodder for the wasteland of problems and pecuniary penchants of piracy and pernicious paupers.  You become erased and digitally deleted from those seemingly happy images of office parties and ceremonial accolades where words of praise once were dispensed with generous helpings and heaps of adjectives and adverbs not often heard.  You become the nobody that you always were perceived to be behind those lying eyes, had always been, and forever considered; you just didn’t know it before the occurrence of confirmed establishment.

Perhaps we know too much today, because information is cheap and available; and perhaps giants never roamed the earth in epochs extinguished by time and modernity; for the figures larger than life are nowhere to be found, but in what we make of our lives through sheer effort, planning, and genuine concern for the man sitting right next to us.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Medical Retirement from Federal Government: The Run

Stockings and watercolors do it; time, with quietude and solace of a steady march, moving with predictable sequence like the consistency of a drumbeat; and, of course, the rhythm reminiscent of cardiac health, as do joggers and concerned citizens chasing down a purse snatcher to retrieve a possession of identity.  And life, too.

Sometimes, there is a good “run” of something — a lengthy period of calm and productivity, where all of the pistons of a complex and interactive mechanism akin to a turbo engine are firing away in tandem, and life is good, fruitful and positive.  But the inevitability of a breakdown can always be around the proverbial corner; a medical condition, suffered by a Federal or Postal employee, is not merely a stoppage of such a “run”, but can be a disruptive cacophony of ceaseless interruptions, both to career and to personal contentment.

The key is to get beyond, over, or around the obstacle which lands in the middle of one’s pathway for future well-being.  The child who fails to see the watercolors running; the invention of the stockings that never run; the life that seemingly runs smoothly; all, a perspective wrought at a price of neglect or deliberate ruse.  The fact is, life always has interruptions.

A medical condition can be a major one, and when it begins to prevent one from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s positional duties, the Federal or Postal employee under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset may need to consider an alternate course and begin anew a run of a different sort.

Filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits is indeed a change of course.  It involves a complex bureaucratic strategy to get from point A to destination B, and the administrative obstacles are many, but not insurmountable.  And, like the verb itself, it provides many meanings for differing circumstances, but the one and central root of the process involves embracing the paradigm that life is never as easy as one thinks, and like the child who believes that he is the next Picasso in training, the run of the unpredictable always betrays the truth of our condition.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire