FERS Medical Retirement from OPM: Fiction and Falsity

Are the two the same?  Or, is it the awareness which bifurcates the two into a conscious difference?

Fiction is one thing, falsity, quite another.  When fiction is put forth as fact, then it is falsity by another name; but falsity is what it is from the very beginning; it does not transform like Kafka’s Metamorphosis because the intent behind the falsity was to deceive, to begin with.  Movies; novels; television shows — they all give us the fiction of entertainment; but how we embrace them and live our lives within the fiction of our own lives, blurs the distinction between Fiction and Falsity.

It is, perhaps, an insidious, incremental falsity which begins to invade our daily lives.  We watch such action films — of the Bourne Sagas, or the 007 series & Mission Impossible movies, and we begin to perceive the world as somehow inclusively integrating such fiction; perhaps in distant beliefs that our government reflects some partial psychosis of such representations.  And when we read or hear of governmental misdeeds, we harken back and say to ourselves: See?

What happened in those fictional movies actually happens, even though falsity would — or should — protect us from such absurdities.  But read a short story like Ferdinand von Shirach’s tale entitled, “Self-Defense”.  It is fiction, but clearly based upon his experience as a top Criminal Defense Lawyer in Berlin.  Is it “fiction”?  Yes, at least officially.  Is it Falsity?  Just as clearly — not.

It is beyond fiction or falsity, because it is real and true.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, where the medical condition prevents the Federal or Postal employee from continuing in your Federal or Postal job, it is always important to distinguish between Fiction, Falsity and the reality of your situation.

As the U.S. Office of Personnel Management is clearly an agency which is ready to pounce upon any indicia of fictional falsity, you may want to contact a FERS Disability Attorney who specializes in FERS Disability Retirement Law, to make sure that your representation of reality doesn’t cross the line into Fiction or Falsity.

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 & Federal Employee Disability Retirement from the OPM: Fighting for Your Rights

Everything of value is worth fighting for.  Further, just because you win a battle, it does not mean that the “war” has been victorious.  Of course, the language of “war”, “battle”, “fight”, etc., is often overused and can be misinterpreted, and perhaps over-hyped: games are games; a football game is not truly a war; an administrative process of “fighting” for disability retirement benefits is not strictly a “battle”, but merely a legal process of obtaining a benefit.

When we utilize and apply words in context-specific circumstances, we tend to misinterpret the true nature of the process.

In Federal Disability Retirement Law, however, the metaphors used are, indeed, appropriate — “fighting” for your rights is the applicable wording, and being prepared to “battle” with OPM is also appropriate.  Federal Disability Retirement benefits are worth fighting for; it is of great value; and, once won, you must continue to maintain vigilance in retaining your benefits.

Contact a Federal Disability Lawyer who specializes in OPM Disability Retirement Law and make sure that you understand the value of what the “battle” is you are fighting for.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire
OPM Disability Retirement Lawyer

 

Federal Employees with Chronic Medical Conditions: What to Do

It is the universal question which confronts us all: The next steps; how to react; what sequence of actions to take; and, in the end, it also involves any verbal or written responses, as well.  For, the “doing” part can involve both actions and words.

From the little boy confronting a bully who asks the question, “What are you going to do about it?” — to the adult who is faced with a crisis which may involve other family members, where the question is somewhat altered: “What are we going to do about it?” — the answer is not always clear; the response, not always known.

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, “What to do” is the question posed, the problem confronted.

We are never expected to know everything, although all of us would like to think that we have an answer to most of life’s problems.  But this is a unique circumstance, a special order, a confrontation of unknown proportions.  And when you are faced with the unknown, it is best to contact someone who is experienced in the “What” and the “Doing” in response to the “what”.

Contact a Federal Disability Attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law and begin the process of confronting the “what” — as in, What to Do?

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Long-Term Disability Retirement from Federal Government Employment: Incompatibility

It is essentially the “fourth” criteria in a Federal Disability Retirement case — the first three being, whether or not a Federal or Postal worker can show to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management a deficiency in performance, conduct or attendance.

Unfortunately, the performance-review system is often one of an afterthought — of Supervisors and Managers giving “Outstanding” or “Fully Successful” ratings for all employees just to get through the process and avoid the headache of an appeal or grievance response.

So long as the Federal or Postal worker is healthy, such favorable performance reviews are great.  However, when a medical condition hits a Federal or Postal employee, and the need arises to file for Federal Disability Retirement benefits, then that is the time that such favorable performance reviews are scrutinized and used against you by the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.

The argument goes thus: Your Agency says you are doing such a good job; so, how can you now say you cannot do your job?  It is that fourth criteria — one of incompatibility — which often forms the foundation for filing a Federal Disability Retirement application.

Contact a FERS Disability Retirement Lawyer who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law and begin the process of determining whether you meet the criteria to qualify for Federal Disability Retirement benefits with OPM.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill
FERS Disability Attorney

 

FERS Disability Retirement from OPM: How You are Viewed

Perhaps you are one of the rarest of breeds; the “rugged individual” who cares not what others think, how you are viewed, what people consider, etc.  Most who claim such a stance use it merely as an implacable facade; how many tears are shed and frustrations are voiced in the privacy of one’s home, we will never know.

“Self-image” is a running movie within one’s head, constantly updated by the feedback generated through daily discourse.  What we think of ourselves; the image of the individual in the mirror in front of you; the morning picture reflected back as you brush your teeth, comb your hair, etc.  Who is that person.  He/She is: Profession X; Gender Y; Relationship Status Z; Known within the community as A & B, etc.

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 continuing in his or her career, “How you are viewed” will change.  No longer are you the competent worker, the one who has dedicated him or herself to a career; no longer that Supervisor, Co-worker or colleague; now, to be deemed as a Federal Disability Retiree.

It is a transition that is often difficult, because it alters the self-image you have held for so many years.  But “difficult” was derived from “necessity”, and the reality is that the essence of the “real you” will not change despite filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits under FERS.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Medical Retirement under FERS: Revisiting Updike

He wrote about mundane things; of middle class neighborhoods, Pennsylvania towns in which he grew up; farmlands before strip malls replaced them against the skyline of cornfield rows; and of affairs that grew naturally out of a revolution emancipated from the Sixties; of quiet sufferings and the rhythmic monotony of ordinary lives.

John Updike was an “in-betweener” — too young to fight in WWII, too old to have been drafter for the Vietnam debacle; and so he experienced the quietude and normalcy in between the two bookends of this country’s tumult and trials.

Updike was a voice for generations who saw the post-war era, of baby-boomers and American prosperity at its zenith; of the loss of any normative confluence of moral dictum and the abandonment of constraints once imposed by Protestantism.  All, of course, with a twinkle in his eye and a ready smile.  The Internet abounds with photographs of this uniquely American author — almost all with that thin smile as if he was about to share a private joke.

The Tetralogy of the Rabbit novels (actually a quintet if you include the last of the series, a novella entitled “Rabbit Remembered”) evinces a country gone soft after the harsh period of the Great Depression, the Second World War, the Korean conflict and the Vietnam era that undermined the ethical mandates known for generations before, unleashing a liberty of hidden sins like a bubbling cauldron of untamed desires.  But in the end, he is best known for the mundane, the ordinary, and how life in the suburbs of a prosperous nation left an emptiness unspeakable except by a voice given in narrative brilliance, from an author who was a regular contributor to The New Yorker.

Somehow, he made the ordinary seem exciting, even relevant.  By contrast, modernity has focused upon the rich and famous, and of greater unreachable glamour where perfection surpasses pragmatism.  Updike was able to make the commonplace seem important, the ordinary appear significant and the monotony of the mundane as not merely prosaic.  And isn’t that all that we seek, in the end?

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, the loss of relevance, the ordinary and the commonplace is what often scares the Federal or Postal employee.

The job itself; the career; the monotonous routine of going to work, yet finding relevance in the act of “making a living” — these were all taken for granted in Updike’s short stories.  That other stuff — of infidelities and dalliances — were a deviation that Updike tried to point out as mere fluff in otherwise ordinary lives; and of medical conditions, they upend and disrupt the normalcy we all crave.

Federal Disability Retirement is a means to an end — of bringing back balance within a life that has become disrupted, but it is a way to bring back order where disruption to the mundane has left behind a trail of chaos.  And to that, the twinkle in Updike’s eyes and the thin smile would tell us that he would approve of such a move which will return you back to a life of mundane normalcy.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Medical Retirement under FERS: When something is determined

How do we know that a person is “good”?  Or articulate?  Or of a criminal bent?  When do we say, “Oh, the movie is too boring,” and then proceed to turn it off and go and do something else?  Or, at what point does a person determine that a book is worthwhile?

Is there a “set” point, or does it just depend upon different tolerance levels for each individual, such that some people will stubbornly refuse to give upon on X, whereas others with less patience will easily abandon any sense of loyalty or dependence?  As to the latter — of “dependence” — is there a point of unhealthy attachment even when everyone else has given up the proverbial ship?  To that end — when does “loyalty” begin to smell of foolhardy obedience to signs others would otherwise deem as self-destructive?

At what point does a person consider the ratio between toleration of a boring book or movie in comparison to the potentiality for a better ending, and continue on the trek of boredom in hopes of realizing a greater and more exciting future?  Are there character-traits by which we can determine a “healthy” sense of determination as opposed to a weak-willed willingness to be trampled upon or waste one’s time and energy?

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 job, the “when” of determining — as in, “When is it time to file for Federal Disability Retirement?” — is something that must be gauged according to the uniqueness of each individual circumstance.

Certainly, when the Agency begins to initiate adverse actions; certainly, when a doctor or health care provider recommends such a course of action; and, certainly, when it becomes apparent that the Federal employee can no longer perform one or more of the basic elements of one’s particular Federal job.

When something is determined — it is an important analytical judgment that must be decided in light of the fact that preparing, formulating and filing for FERS Disability Retirement benefits is a long and complex administrative, bureaucratic process, and consultation with an experienced attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law is a first step in determining that which is important to determine when something needs to be determined about.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire
FERS Disability Retirement Advocate

 

OPM Medical Retirement under FERS: Appropriateness

How does one learn it, and if one never recognizes its opposite — inappropriateness — does that then shield one from recognition of its negative consequences?  Is it the suddenly silence of the room, the averted eyes of those around, or the pink flush of a blush that suddenly tells of the inappropriateness of what was said, or done?  But what of its antonym — do we learn only when someone else says, “Yes, yes, quite appropriate“, and if so, how did that person learn what was or wasn’t?

Is appropriateness merely a human convention, an artificial construct that allows for a mindless continuum that barely retains its relevance beyond the insularity of a self-contained characteristic?

For federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who are considering preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, whether the Federal employee is under FER05S, CSRS or CSRS Offset, the appropriateness of what to include in a Federal Disability Retirement application, to be filed with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, is often a question of discretion and experience.

What evidence, beyond the obvious medical evidence, can and should be filed?  What should be included in one’s Statement of Disability as required on SF 3112A, Applicant’s Statement of Disability?  How much personal information, historical facts and background data should be “appropriately” included in the Applicant’s Statement of Disability?  Should family members, friends or coworkers provide a statement, as well, and is it “appropriate” to do so?

In the end, appropriateness is a concept that should be tailored by the context of the action, and it might be a good idea to consult with an experienced attorney before preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, as such a consultation would certainly constitute an appropriateness under the circumstances, and may well be inappropriate to fail to do so.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Federal Disability Retirement: The Glare of Another

What we do in response to outside stimuli; whether we flee, prepare to defend, aggressively pursue, or otherwise stand idle with resignation and do nothing; whither to stand in consternation or to wither without care; throughout, it is the glare of the world, whether by glint of sunlight upon objects surrounding us, or through another’s eyes which magnify the hostility abounding, which requires our tepid psyche to stir in turmoil.

The test of life is often not in others, but in ourselves.  By then, perhaps the fight is gone; maybe the slow and incremental shavings that took years to whittle away, manifest a pile of residue left behind, and forever depleting any reserve of response, or stir a final call to arms.

Life has a way of deadening the soul, but it is often the glare of another which provokes the stirrings of the remains of the day.  When driving, the sudden glare of sunlight results in a raised hand or reaching for the visor, without thought, in a protective mode; or a reactive temper arising in response to an offending pair of eyes directed with hostility and provocation; in either case, life stirs, and the vestiges of a fight thought lost and gone forever, return with a vengeance and a fury of energy and strength.  Don’t ever think that the battle is lost, lest surrender means giving in to cowardice and contemptuous cocoon’s of cornered avarice.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who daily suffer the indignities of harassment and malice at the hands of the Federal agency or the U.S. Postal Service, who have “given their all” throughout these years, decades and large sections of life and time, the need to file for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management can often be determined by the level of fight left in one’s self.  Like squinting an eye to examine the level of oil left by pulling out the long and flexible dipstick from the deep caverns of an engine hidden under the hood of a vehicle, the need to stop and examine one’s life represents a pitstop at a station of reserve.

Filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through OPM is not a surrender of any magnitude; it is, rather, a response which shows that necessity is recognized, that there is life beyond the “mission of the agency” or the “important work” of the U.S. Postal Service, and being treated in ways demeaning does not mandatorily correlate to one’s deteriorating health.

Preparing, formulating and filing for OPM Disability Retirement benefits, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, is not an indicator of one’s reserve of strength or vitality left in check, but rather the necessary response, thoughtlessly reactive or otherwise, when the glare of another hits the Federal or Postal employee without warning or prefatory contingencies, and when life and living are realized and identified as precious beyond mere voodoo of echoing motions set long ago in a time when youth beckoned beyond call of purpose.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

OPM Disability Retirement: The Soul of a Case

If you ascribe something to everything, then nothingness results.  For, to declare that all of X is contained in Y is to delete X into irrelevancy, and leave Y with nothing but X, thereby subsuming everything with nothing.  Thus, when we argue for a form of pantheism, the language of “all” tends to diminish the uniqueness of singularity, and the meanings of distinction and difference.  Fortunately, however, separate identities naturally manifest for specific entities where the exceptional outshines the mundane.

For human beings, the exceptional occurs daily precisely because there exist no mundane souls, only ones whose lives have developed a callousness to tragedy so thick that empathy has been extinguished for the price of a forgotten soul.  Thus do we have the proverbial “faceless bureaucrat” who merely stamps all incoming papers with repetitive monotony, and fails to view the content and substantive humanity beneath the surface of the linguistic mirage of daily deluge.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers formulating one’s Federal Disability Retirement application, that is the door one is attempting to unlock, isn’t it?  Every case has a unique “soul” to it; but from the viewpoint of a bureaucracy, such an argument only extinguishes the singularity of one’s own extraordinary circumstances into all others, and by doing so, that “something” becomes mere nothingness.

The key to cut through to the soul of the administrative process is by revealing the separateness of a Federal Disability Retirement case with the individuality of “this” case, in “this” instance, for “this” reason.

That is a tall order to fulfill.

For, as each Federal Disability Retirement application has a human story to tell, so the paper presentation to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, must provide a narrative with a soul, and one which is not merely one among many, but unique in its singularity of particular facts and circumstances.  In other words, the “soul” of the case must be delineated with a soulful echo of humanity.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire