FERS & CSRS Disability Retirement: The perfect person

By all accounts, he or she doesn’t exist, except perhaps in theoretical constructs of theological paradigms; and of academia, where one may argue some alternate version of Anselm’s argument by positing that, because the concept of perfection could not be thought of without the reality of a Being constituting perfection, ergo a perfect Being – God – must by necessity exist.

Yet, we live “as if” the perfect person exists – either imposing such a standard unknowingly, unwittingly and unwillingly upon our own selves, or by thinking that movie characters actually exist somewhere in the ephemeral world of Hollywood, Instagram and Facebook concoctions that only put forward to the public’s eye the image of perfection.

We overlook the distorted concept of perfection when we say of a movie character, “Oh, he’s not perfect; he drinks too much, cheats on his spouse and is violent.”  Yet, the make-believe character still solves the mystery, is philosophically coherent when drunk, and somehow remains an attractive character despite all such character flaws.  In other words, despite the appearance of flaws, we make gods of characters we create.

It is the same on the Internet – despite the knowledge by all that there does not exist the perfect person, nevertheless, we allow for Facebook postings and Instagram photographs of meals, dogs, kids, families, selves and neighborhoods as the perfect depiction of unblemished lives.  And of ourselves, perhaps the greatest of culprits alive – for perpetuating the mythological depiction by engaging in the flim-flam of projecting the existence of the perfect person.

Yet, what is the alternative?  No one wants to hear the perpetual whining of the constant apologist – that person who points out his own failures and shortcomings at the drop of the proverbial hat; of he who apologizes for the slightest of errors, the scent of a mistake and a hint of failure to reach perfection.  Name a movie character or a movie, excepting a comedy, where the character is merely a bundle of imperfections and unattractive to boot.  Even Inspector Clouseau in the Pink Panther series, played long ago by Peter Sellers and by others more recently, captured the culprit in the end, despite all of the blunders and pitfalls.

In the end, we all participate in the grand larceny of perpetuating the existence of the perfect person – until we are hit with a medical condition, and the façade then suddenly falls apart.  Yet, everyone else continues in the charade.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who can no longer keep up with the make-believe world of the perfect person because of a medical condition, where the medical condition prevents the appearance of the perfect person to perform all of the essential elements of the Federal or Postal job, it may be time to admit imperfection by preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, to be submitted ultimately to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the imperfect Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset.

For, in the end, it is the perfect person who embraces the imperfection of this world, and that is at least a beginning for the Federal or Postal employee who must continue to face the Federal Agency or the Postal Service in facing the reality of living imperfectly in this all too perfect universe.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

OPM Medical Disability: The constant fight against the negative

There are different ages in different times, designated by the dominance of one entity over another. Thus do we refer to the “Age of Dinosaurs”, or the “Ice Age”; the Age of Feudal Lords; the Age of Man, of course, is a general aegis under which everything falls, once the four-peddling quadrant of living beings became dominated by the bi-pedaling progenitor of carnivorous over-consumption that prevails from time immemorial to the present “age”.

Modernity had now become the “age of therapy”, where somehow psychiatry and therapeutic intervention has come to dominate the basic necessities of life.  Perhaps that is appropriate, as the daily stresses that govern the requirements of survival have mandated a vicious cycle of inestimable pain, both in terms of physical deterioration and cognitive dissonance, by placing an intolerable level of stresses upon daily living.

It is this constant fight against the negative that we are told, holds the key to a “happier” life.  Can change in perspective, of outlook and viewpoint, simply by inserting “positive” language games into the daily soliloquy of internal voices make such a difference?  If language were non-existent, and we became a species of grunts and grumbling noises (which, if you pause and listen around you, comprises much of what passes off as “conversation”, anyway), would we be anymore “positive” than what we are today?

What if the human vocabulary were to be reduced to only positive declaratives and adjectives that only revealed “good” things – would such expunging of negative concepts result in the net effect of everyone “feeling good”?  Or, does “feeling” precede language, such that one can be negative in one’s essence before expression of that negativity, such that thoughts are merely the natural consequence of a state of negativity, anyway?

Medical conditions tend to make liars of us all; for, we can go through life imagining that we are somehow the “exception”, and those “others” who are beset with medical conditions did something “wrong” to have been hit with a medical condition – until it happens to us, as well.  Suddenly, with the reality of pain, suffering, and the general human condition of illness, sickness and debilitating injury, we realize our mortality, our susceptibility to a viral plague, and our fragile existence.  How others view us also changes.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, such that the constant fight against the negative become a daily struggle that often takes its toll, preparing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, may become a necessary next step in such a daily struggle.

The constant fight against the negative, itself, will have its impact, and it may be that the combination of the medical condition, the adversity shown by the Federal agency or Postal facility, and the negative internal thoughts that insidiously devalue and destroy, will come to a coalescence of intolerable stress.  When that happens, it is time to consider filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits, to be filed with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, as another step in the constant fight against the negative.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Disability Retirement under FERS & CSRS: The character of each day

What does the day bring?  Do we awaken, put our finger up to the winds of time or the breeze of the day and ask that question before getting up, dressing and opening the door into a world beyond that may or may not fulfill the promises we believe to be granted?  Or, regardless of the indications, the barometers that forewarn or the compass that fails to direct, do we nevertheless move forward and tackle the challenges faced or otherwise deliberately and willfully avoid?

Does it make a difference, in an “objective” sense, whether we consult the horoscope or check the biodynamic calendar to see if it is an “unfortunate” day to engage in this or that activity; or to stay away from groups of people identified by certain signs or symptoms, revealed or otherwise concealed?

What determines the character of each day – the world at large, the elements within, of the person who steps out into the world?  Or, like the old puzzle that even the Sphinx could not answer, is it by genetic dominance, predetermination and the innate structure of our DNA, or the environment that one is brought up in that forms and conforms the individual personality, content and essence of an individual?

It is always interesting to observe the ritualistic tendencies of each individual that one engages in before battling the turmoil of the day’s challenges; whether one exercises before or after; does eating a meal energize or bloat; are there superstitions embraced before the car door is opened and shut and the engine of time begins the day; these and more determine the character, for many, of each day.

For the Federal employee and U.S. Postal worker who must by necessity battle with the medical condition unasked for, unsolicited and without regard to a choice of superstitions allowed, the character of each day has already been somewhat determined.  The only question remaining is, can you endure the harassment from the job, the lack of respect and the constant undermining of accommodations requested by forging forward despite the lack of character in others already shown each day, or is it time to prepare an effective 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?

Sometimes, the character of the each day is determined not so much by the content of one’s own inner strength, but by the lack thereof in others, and that is something that you cannot do anything about except to “move on” and leave behind the Federal agency or the Postal facility that fails to show any character at all, each day or any day.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Disability Retirement from Federal Government Employment: Stamina

The Latin origin refers to “threads” and the foundation of a fabric; of endurance, strength and the power to resist.  It is the energy that is sustained, propelling the essence of a person’s illuminated core that lasts despite the destructive tears and moth-eaten wear that may slowly deteriorate the woven fabric that slowly untangles the aggregate of the cloth.  Fabrics are peculiar entities; there are enough analogies made of them, of the correlative concept that the singular threads poses the threat of weakness and inability to survive, but the collective aggregation with each additional reinforcement provides an almost invincible compendium of strengthened stalwart.

How does one cut through such a wall or obstacle?  By going back to the origins and roots – by cutting one thread at a time where the fray is shown or the weakness manifested; and thus do illnesses, viruses and medical conditions begin to deplete the human stamina that once possessed the power of endurance and energy to resist.  It may begin with a short period of illness, where the system’s immunity is attacked.

At first, the body still has the collective energy of reserve to easily fight off the infection.  Then, however, work, life and responsibilities compel one to do the very opposite of that which the body requires in order to recover – instead of resting and allowing the reconstruction of one’s immunity, the body is forced to undergo the stresses of modernity by going back to work, being compelled to endure despite the weakened state, and by sheer power of will, to ignore fatigue, sleep and the call for peaceful rest.

Then, by the body’s internal mechanism of using stored spurts of petrol, with the internal coursing of adrenalin to become the lifeblood of fueled turbo-infusions, a functional state of recovery is felt; except that, by chance, fate or bad luck, a regressive second stage is brought on by a subsequent attack, a recurrence of the illness or some other foreign invasion, and further debilitation occurs.  It is at such a critical juncture that we often make the mistake of trying to get a “quick fix” to the problem, and either ignore it, push through or fail to recognize the danger-symptoms.

Stamina requires rest and restoration in order to maintain the warehouse of vitality; it is meant for the long haul and the constancy of endurance for the period of human life.  By abusing the privilege of the woven fabric gifted, we allow for the edges to fray and the vulnerability to become exposed.  The natural need for rest is a luxury we can no longer afford in modernity, and so we push onward despite the warning signs imminently cautioning such paths of self-destruction.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who are contemplating 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, the dual challenge must be faced:  First, the acceptance of one’s medical condition and disability, and the use of one’s stamina to endure that new state of acceptability; and, second, to push through the lengthy process of preparing, formulating, filing and waiting upon the administrative morass of a Federal Disability Retirement procedure.

In the end, the Federal and Postal employee who by necessity of a medical condition must undergo the complex bureaucratic process of filing a Federal Disability Retirement application, will have to utilize the stored stamina that is the fabric of life, and continue to maintain the frayed threads of that vital energy which is the essence of beginnings.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire  
OPM Disability Retirement Lawyer

   

Medical Retirement for Federal & Postal Employees: Usurping dreams

What happened to them?  Where did those once youthful and exuberant conduits taking us beyond the monotony of the present disappear to?  When did we allow for “practicality” and “being real”, of “growing up” and “becoming responsible” to usurp the dreams of our youth?  Did we misjudge, misunderstand and misapply the principles first taught, and confuse the two concepts – of having a “realistic viewpoint” and abandoning all dreams and hopeful fantasies?

The two are not mutually exclusive; one can still work upon one’s dreams, yet go about the work-a-day world to make a living and pursue a career.  Ah, but then, life intervenes and interrupts, doesn’t it?  Is that why children are delayed, trips are cancelled and i-phones are kept in sacrosanct altars beneath the altered photographs of our imagined pasts?  Is the procrastination invited, the delayed life intruded upon and the project-time of 5-year plans extended, precisely because if we keep pushing beyond and giving ourselves excuses for inaction, there will one day come a time when we will admit that it is too late?

Usurping dreams is the insidious encroachment of cynicism shadowing our once promising beginnings, and the pendulum that allows for the heavy turn when clocks no longer run, thoughts become stale and creativity is suddenly disposed of, then the stench of human decay begins to set in, and we slowly die a death we once mourned in the youthful hope of our former times.

Usurping dreams is like the virus that gnaws away at the flesh of joy; usurping dreams is like the broken cane that once held the weight of an old man’s hand and allowed for ambulation, and no matter how many time you tape it together or glue the fissure, the weakest point of the break never quite heals; and usurping dreams is like the Book of Plans once gathered, then put aside into the cellar of one’s forgotten memories, only to remain in haunting whispers, always calling, never being heard but in the darkness where fears are touched and enlivened by the sunlight never quite seen for want of bringing back those youthful memories of exuberant smiles and unselfish shouts of pure happiness.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, such that the medical condition begins to prevent the Federal or Postal worker from performing one or more of the essential elements of the Federal or Postal job, the question is:  Did the career do it; did the medical condition do it; or is there still hope beyond the medical condition and the career?

Preparing a Federal Disability Retirement application, to be filed with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal employee or U.S. Postal worker is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, has now become a necessity.  The only real question remaining is whether the same pause which allowed for usurping of dreams those many years ago is the identical weakness of groundless fears that prevents you from taking that next step into a still-hopeful future.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

FERS & CSRS Disability Retirement: The Redshirt

In athletic parlance, it refers to an individual and a status, allowing for a fifth year of eligibility when the rules mandate a restriction to a four-year period.  The word itself is quite malleable, and reflects well the technicality involved in avoiding the direct letter of the language.  Being a redshirt (noun), a redshirt freshman (adjective) or redshirted in his first year (verb) reveals to us the capacity of language to jump like grammatical forms of hopscotching that amazes and intrigues; and the cautionary prelude to a wink-and-a-nod is prefaced with, “You are being too literal”.

It only proves the point, doesn’t it — of the age-old adage that rules are created with the intent of being broken; or, at least bent in order to fit?  For, once such rules were imposed in order to allow for “fairness” in collegiate sports, the “legal technicians” (i.e., lawyers) went immediately to work upon coming up with novel interpretations, strategies for avoidance, and advice to extend beyond what the limitations allowed.

“Redshirting” was one of the devised methodologies – of allowing for everything up to the critical line of demarcation:  that of playing in a game itself.  Thus, the redshirt can practice with the team throughout that entire year of eligibility, but such actions do not count; the redshirted freshman can attend classes, be a full-fledged partner in the “college life”, and yet his participation is not marked against him or her; and to be redshirted in that year of eligibility allows for growth, maturity, advancement in development – all without “using up” a year of eligibility by being sacked a hundred times during the season and becoming a shattered soul devoid of self-confidence and losing assurance of one’s talents and skills.

It is, within the athletic community of college consortiums, a brilliant strategy to deftly avoid the burden of rules; for the greater society, it reflects the essence of what is wrong, precisely because it is a deliberate attempt to avoid the literal language of the rules.  Yet, that is true of almost everything in life, is it not?

Careful study; identifying the loopholes; then initiating the strategy to maneuver around landmines and obstacles.  Is it any different than a hunting party tracking a prey, sniffing out the signs of predatory confirmation and taking in information and adapting accordingly?  Rules, regulations and laws may well be designed, initially, at least, to address a specific problem; and, out of the cauldron of an enacted statutes, comes multiple other problems and issues because of the malleability of words and imprecise linguistic pauses.

Preparing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application is no different.  It is a necessary prerequisite to identify the legal language of eligibility; define the issues; identify whether or not the Federal or Postal employee considering such an option “fits into” the legal criteria circumscribed; then to proceed to “redshirt” one’s own situation and devise a methodology for eligibility.

Compiling the evidence, formulating the proper narrative, and presenting an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, to be submitted to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, can thus be likened to the redshirting of a freshman – in order to extend one’s life beyond the debilitating medical conditions otherwise shortening the career of a promising Federal or Postal employee.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

OPM Disability Retirement: Comfort Zones

For animals, they are often designated as “arc of flight” — that invisible periphery where violation results in immediate retreat or thoughtless stampede.  For humans, it is identified as one’s “space”, or “privacy bubble”, and while self-control and societal norms have curtailed and somewhat dulled the thousands of years of evolutionary refinements to reactive instincts, the palpable discomfort manifested, the shifting unease of taboos violated, and for some, an onset of panic and heightened anxiety are the resulting characteristics of Darwinian antecedents.

Comfort zones apply to the generic aegis of such unseen safety nets.  For most of us, it is comprised of predictability and the security which comes from repetitive monotony.  That is why, even to one’s detriment, one will cling to the known quantity, even if the attraction of the unknown outweighs with obvious benefits and accruals.  Like the frog which sits calmly in a pot of water ever increasingly rising in temperature, the person who walks about within the confines of one’s comfort zone is in danger always of violative harm.

For the Federal employee and the U.S. Postal worker who suffers from a medical condition, such that the medical condition begins to impact one’s ability to perform all of the essential elements of one’s positional duties, the question of the flashpoint — the intersection of continuing in one’s capacity and the harm it inflicts by doing so — is a complex admixture of needs, wants, comfort zones and the desire to persist.

Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers are a hard-working bunch who, in their collective stubbornness, refuse to give up.  Whether under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset matters not; it is not the system, the benefits nor the years of service; rather, it is often the career itself and the involvement with the “mission of the agency”.  It is a sense of belonging, of being part of a group of individuals, an agency, a department, and always with a sense of purpose and sometimes with a clarity of future endeavors.

Having gone to work for these many years, the value of daily routine cannot be underestimated, and therein lies the essence of one’s comfort zone:  life and the foreseeable future.

Filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management is a violation of one’s comfort zone.  It is tantamount to entering the arc of flight for a flock of sheep, or the privacy bubble at a social gathering.  But when a medical condition mandates the necessity of a step for self-preservation, any consideration for one’s comfort zone should be set aside, as the road to attaining the purposive end of an OPM Disability Retirement annuity may test the very fabric of invisible characteristics yet to be revealed.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

OPM Disability Retirement: The Coming Year

Calendric rhythms constitute artificial attempts at becoming partnered with time; like the music to which the dancer dances, there is nothing uglier than being out of step with the aura of a beat.

Eternity of time marches in a continuum without notice or constraint; our bifurcated days are broken down into days, hours, minutes and fractions thereof, as ordered slices like slabs of beef prepared for delectable consumption.  But whether the artificial imposition of our subjective categories have an impact upon the rhythmic tone of a cold and impervious world, is gleaned in rare moments of sudden insights, when a tremor shakes the foundations of tranquility, and we are awakened from the slumber of our own inventions.

Medical conditions tend to do that.  Suddenly, priorities of life must be reordered, calendric impositions of tasks to be accomplished seem to pale in weight of sufficiency, and leisure activities no longer constitute a viable avenue of escape from the drudgery of daily monotony.  Medical conditions bring to the fore the importance of that which is the essence of relevance:  not possessions, not contraptions nor toys of distractions; but of human connections.

For Federal and Postal employees who put so much of their time, effort, lives and worth of energy into the performance of daily work, a medical condition that prevents one from performing the essential elements of one’s positional duties becomes a trauma of sorts, and a shifting of tectonic plates.  Filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal employee or the U.S. Postal worker is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, is an option one should take when once the notion of value, time, priorities and the interruption of calendric rhythms has been evaluated.

In the coming year, there will be moments of clarity and insight, when it becomes obvious that one’s body is attempting to convey a warning, or where the cognitive deluge of despair blares a clarion call for the quietude of yesteryear, when the chains of time were but a hollow echo whistling in the cavernous dark of unknown depths.  The coming year will tell when it is time to file for Federal Disability Retirement.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Postal and Federal Employee Disability Retirement: Seasons

Breaking the vicious cycle of mental and physical disabilities in the Federal Government workplace and in the U.S. Postal Service

It is a self-evident statement, a tautology of sorts, that seasons come and go; for, by definition (and thus an allegedly a priori statement), a season is that which had something preceding it, changed, and will alter its course into a future one, in a cyclical fashion of interminable regularity.  It is the effects upon individuals which often fail to change, as people are not subject to the universal principles of the physical world in the same way as planetary systems and nature’s repetitive elements.

Thus do we include artificial “seasons”, as in the holiday seasons, and wonder why misery and exacerbation of health conditions become magnified during such times.  One is “supposed” to be merry during this time; peace and joy are offered as salutations throughout, as if they are laws of the physical universe; and somehow, if one’s emotional content does not match with the requirements of the season, the sense of guilt pervades and overwhelms.  It is as if we throw a rock into the air, and expect that it will not fall back down to earth; we expect much, and too much, of ourselves and others.

Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, often “feel” the weight of the seasons.  But for them, the change from one into the other is less a difference of degree, and more of substantive loss of rhythmic circularity in a physical world which continues on its rotational axis without caring for the individual.

Federal Disability Retirement is a benefit offered to all Federal and Postal employees who are under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, and allows for the Federal and Postal employee to attain an optional exit from the very circumstances and environment which forces the season of dismay upon the Federal or Postal worker who is beset with 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 filed through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.

While it may not release one from the rotational mandates of seasonal imposition, it does allow one to entertain a different future, and one which conveys a sense of hope for the season beyond, and a brighter Spring of one’s life.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire