OPM Medical Disability under FERS: Memory

There have been many recent works of fiction involving the issue of memory — The Memory Police, by Yoko Ogawa; The Buried Giant (Kazuo Ishiguro); Tell Me an Ending (Jo Harkin); just to name three right off the bat.  Why has it become a recurring theme?

Is Google the culprit — that memory is no longer a skill cultivated; where conversations are suddenly terminated because someone has whipped out their Smartphone and looked up the name of the movie, the meaning of a word, or the line from a book of poetry?  Is rote learning even needed?  Does anyone memorize a poem, a line from a novel, or even a stanza from a rhyme?  Has an angst developed, an anxiety left unexpressed, an educational concern subtly evolved?

If we can Google anything, is there ever a need to memorize?  If we fail to cultivate the tools of memory, will we make more of the same mistakes than ever before?  Wasn’t it some philosopher who said that history will forever repeat itself because short memories spawn the ignorance needed to forget the horrors of war?  Didn’t WWII follow upon a generation who had forgotten that the “War to end all wars” — WWI — was fought to achieve an eternal period of peace?

And Vietnam was forgotten, followed soon thereafter with Afghanistan — and how the media attempted to capture a scene depicting some helicopter evacuating masses of civilians from the top of a building — that imagery of a former time, a forgotten memory, a repetition of history.  But did anyone remember?  Was there any resurfacing of memories?

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, “memory” is precisely what the U.S Office of Personnel Management wants you to forget:  That there is case-law which applies; that the law and statutory authorities require application and compliance; that eligibility for Federal Disability Retirement benefits must follow the regulations overseeing OPM’s decisions, etc.

The U.S Office of Personnel Management often needs some “reminders” of what constitutes legally-sufficient evidence for an approval; and while OPM’s memory may often fade, it is the job of a competent attorney to “remind” them, to shake their forgetfulness and to emphasize that past case-laws still apply in the current state of society’s amnesia, and thus, you should contact a competent and effective attorney to make sure that OPM “remembers” what the law is.

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 under FERS: The Rhythmic Life

We see it in others; of course, musicians possess it; You-tube videos which go viral; some grandmothers who seem to suddenly perk up and perform an amazing series of dance-steps; but beyond performing bodily gyrations of gymnastic beatitudes, the Rhythmic Life is more of a manner of living — of being “in tune” in a comprehensive way, where everything is clicking, where “happiness” is not focused upon because it is already assumed.

When we stop and constantly genuflect over our own state of being, it is an indicated that we are “out of rhythm”.  When an athlete pauses and “thinks” too much about the efficiency of movement, there is something fundamentally wrong.  When the flow of life is paused; when the question mark keeps persisting; when something just doesn’t “feel right” — that intuition is too often the basis of a deeper problem.

Medical conditions distort and cut off the rhythmic life; and when, for Federal and Postal employees, the loss of rhythmic life is disruptive to one’s career and ability to perform all of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal job, it is time to consider preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management under FERS.

Contact a disability attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law and begin the process of re-asserting that Rhythmic Life which has slowly and progressively been lost to the medical condition which incrementally became chronic and debilitating.

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 Disability Retirement: Thanksgiving 2021

The pandemic of 2020 yet haunts us; and while everyone would like for it to become a vestige of a past nightmare, the reality is that the virus will likely be a part of our daily lives for the next decade or more.

Still, there is much to be thankful for — not the least of which, those who have survived the pandemic can gather together and celebrate Thanksgiving 2021.  Then, of course, there is the ongoing controversy surrounding the holiday event itself — of whether or not Bradford’s depiction of the original meal is historically accurate; of America’s history of genocidal maltreatment of indiginous peoples; of ultimately what the meta-meaning of Thanksgiving will bode for the future, etc.

Through it all, Thanksgiving has become, for most, a special time and a good excuse to prepare an elaborate meal, to get together with family and friends, and to celebrate the year’s events and experiences.  For those who believe that the “traditional” story of Thanksgiving must be “conserved” at all costs, just remember that history is never a static story, but always a vibrant telling of a past which evolves with each storyteller.

This is, in fact, an exciting time where new facts are being discovered about our storied past, and whatever the “official” story of Thanksgiving is, becomes, or is fated to be, it is the telling of stories around a dinnertable exploding with conversation, injected with love and joy, which makes for the meta-Thanksgiving of 2021 — survivors all, where blessings can actually be counted.

Happy Thanksgiving, 2021.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill,
Attorney for Federal Disability Retirement

 

FERS Medical Retirement from the OPM: The wasted life

Perception is one thing; reality is quite another.  Plato’s entire compendium of works can be reduced to the essence of that thought: The worth of life’s goal is to embrace pure Being, the reality that surrounds, and to distinguish between appearance and truth; the allegory of the Cave; the arguments with Thrasymachus; the diatribes against the poets — the latter, because they distort perception and create myths by which people live for and believe in.

Some would argue that the starkness of reality cannot be the sole arbiter of life’s value; that poetry adds to the worth of life, even if misperception of Being dominates.  What is a life’s value, and how is it determined?  Who considers that a life is wasted, and by what standard do we judge?

In the Allegory of the Cave — when the man who frees himself from the shackles of misperception climbs up and sees the sunlight: What if he desires to go back into the darkness of untruth, precisely because the unreality of the world is preferable to the pureness of Being?  And how much of convention and human folly attaches upon the judgment of worth?

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 judgment of others in determining the valuation of one’s life often gets in the way of doing that which is “best” for one’s circumstances.

Yes, career and continuation in a secure, stable job is important; and, yes, financial stability for the future is an important consideration in the decision-making process.  But so is health and the balance of one’s life.

When health becomes a concern where there arises an incompatibility between work and well-being, the latter must always be chosen as a priority over the former.  And while others may judge that an interruption of a promising career constitutes the wasted life, such conclusions are made by those who, like the unfettered encounter of the man in the Allegory of the Cave who sees the pure Being of reality by looking up at the sunlight, it is the blinding darkness of ignorance that follows which makes for poor judgment and lack of insight into another’s life.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

OPM Medical Retirement Legal Representation: “It would happen, anyway…”

This can be a catch-all excuse, of course.  Fatalism is a self-contradictory philosophical perspective; one cannot by definition remain in such a belief-system without experiencing the self-immolation of one’s own convictions.  What if we prefaced each and every one of our actions with such a statement. “It would happen, anyway.”

The operative principle falls behind the “It”, of course, and the remainder of the fatalism makes sense when once we identify the opening dummy subject that is otherwise left unstated, as a pronoun that remains unattended, often purposefully.  The “It”, of course, can mean many things, including: death; failure; a disastrous outcome; complete destruction, etc.

To conclude that X would happen regardless of the causal interventions of human resolve perpetuated by the will of a conscious mind, is to attribute to the universe a determinism that is without design or goodness.  Is there such an omnipotent being that cares not, perhaps similar to Aristotle’s Unmoved Mover?  Of such a being, Aristotle of course did not conceptualize a meddling kind of god, good or bad, but rather where perfection caused others to desire reaching towards its apex of unperturbed immovability.

But why must fatalism always posit the negative?  Why must it always end in disaster, death or progressive decay, and not towards some optimism of a future yet to be determined?  Why don’t we hear anyone say, instead, “Oh, it would happen, anyway…”, but implying that the dummy subject of “It” is meant to connote greater fortunes for tomorrow, a happier life to be had, or better days ahead of health and joy?

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who are stuck in the rut of a negative outlook because of a medical condition that pervades and will not go away, it is time to replace the dummy subject of “It” with a pronoun or other grammatical subject that conveys a positive outlook upon life’s travails.

Filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, is an important first step in filling in the “unknowns” of life’s tomorrows.  And, ultimately, that is the key point, isn’t it?

To avert, subvert and otherwise replace the negative with a positive — and for a Federal employee who can no longer perform all of the essential elements of one’s position, it is the negative “It” that must be replaced with a positive and effective Federal Disability Retirement Application, lest fatalism lead to a determinism that undermines the positive tomorrows that are yet to be.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

FERS/CSRS Disability Retirement: Of tripe, tropes and trickling trivialities

One rarely thinks in terms of multiple stomachs, but certainly cows have them; but when we consider the tripe of language, we project only the inherent foolishness of man.  Of tropes, we may envision a higher calling; though, of course, figurative speech requires greater imagination and creativity, and the dullness of many falls back naturally into either the first or second stomachs of the bovine kind, and not merely to be digested and emitted through the natural canals of intestinal tracts, but by metaphorical heights of human depravity.  Then, of course, there are trivialities, and most of the drip-drip-drip sort, and never in voluminous waves of profundities, but merely superficial utterances of inane particles.

Much of everyday phenomena falls into one of the three categories; and of the first, it allows for wiggle-room into a fourth because of the dual definitions presented.  Indeed, there is great similarity between tripe and truth.  In actuality, farmers will tell us that the cow has only one stomach, but with four distinctive compartments, identified as the Rumen, the Reticulum, the Omasum and the Abomasum.  It is the last of the four which actually digests the food, but the first three allow for the complex mixing of saliva and digestive enzymes, the processing and breaking down of the products of the earth taken in – sort of like an organic factory.

That is the awe of it all, isn’t it –and the irony; for, we see the bovine creature, stoic with its forlorn eyes, standing in its own manure in order to be treated as an assembly-line receptacle in order to produce products to be shipped across the country, and contained within its multiple compartments comprises a reflection of the type of efficiencies which we attempt to mirror and copy.  And then, on top of it all, we slaughter and tear out the first two or three in order to create delicacies for those who prefer the delectable entrees of chefs known to make masterpieces out of common fodder.  Of tropes, of course, we categorize as thoughtful reproaches less evident because of their figurative requirements; but of trickling trivialities, we have to endure because much of society has become entrapped by the inane details of personal lives and stardom’s prurient interests.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who are considering 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 beckoning call must come neither from tripe, nor tropes, nor even from trickling trivialities.

For, in the end, the need to file for Federal Disability Retirement benefits comes about precisely because the seriousness of the medical condition compels one to view other problems as mere trickling of trivialities; that the suffering, pain and anxiety created by the medical condition is no longer a figurative existence like the tropes of literature; and with great certainty, we come to recognize that the digestive processes of a tripe cannot cure the reflective need to change the produce of a world uncaring, even if it is sifted through the complex compartments of a bovine creature, leaving aside the inane foolishness of the world’s loss of character in a life still valued for future engagement.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Federal Employee Medical Retirement: Avoiding the anarchy of thoughtless acts

Life requires acting; successful living demands thoughtful acts.  Every good stage manager recognizes the signs; there are those who float through the script, with nary a cognitive engagement; others who involve themselves with an exhaustive turmoil of stipends unpaid; and still, those who think that talent alone will carry one through, despite the mediocrity which has surfaced unabashed, and where fingerprints left behind of tattered devastation betraying the lack of success.

Do we ever really “get over” our own ignorance or arrogance?  It is said that the two go hand-in-hand, like cousins who dress identically, or twins who hide their natural jealousies by inventing figments of unborn siblings.  It is because we need to compensate for our ignorance that our arrogant character traits surface; and by our arrogant personalities, we reveal the depths of our vacuity.

In history, there never has been a successful civilization based upon anarchical designs; despots and totalitarian conduits aside, such an institutionalization of disarray would never work.  We already have that in supposedly “organized” governments: bureaucracies of mammoth proportions that continue to thrive on indolence and disrepair.

In a state of anarchy, there isn’t even the semblance of competence; as everything is allowed to work without rules, principles or vicarious rationalizations for perpetual existence, so the inherent despair of personal destruction would prevail over any healthy ego or psyche which attempted to reassemble and reorganize.

But what of individual acts?  Does cruelty originate from an anarchy of thoughtless acts, or do they appear from a deliberative consciousness of knowing resolve?  Must institutions reflect the disarray of individual minds, or does a collective anarchy somehow transcend the singularity of thoughtful vacuity, and translate by pure osmosis a secularization of bifurcated consciousness?  Since when was cruelty excused because of lack of thought, when all throughout history it was precisely that principled requirement which mandated good manners and decorum of proper living?

We have come to a point in history where we have accepted a degraded standard, an institutionalization of mediocrity, and thus the faceless shame of inhumanity.  In the end, we will pay a price for such a state of concession, with a thousand cuts inflicted daily.

For the Federal and Postal employee who suffers from a medical condition, such that the medical condition prevents the Federal and Postal employee from performing one or more of the essential elements of his or her positional duties, the daily harassment, hostile environment and constant bludgeoning of the fatigued workforce is but a microcosmic reflection of the greater macro-indicia of a world gone mad. One may take some consolation in the dismissive aside that, “It is nothing personal” – but that is indeed some minor conciliatory excuse.

Filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management may not be the best option available, but it is that which attempts to preserve a scintilla of dignity, as a safeguard away from the daily imputation of cruelty designed, and a means to avoid the anarchy of thoughtless acts.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

OPM Medical Retirement Lawyer: The Complexity of Unpredictability

Some view human behavioral unpredictability as a declaration of the underlying complexity; others would have it that, far from any such convoluted aspiration towards mystery and intricacy, a yawn and ensuing boredom more likely represents the determinism and simplicity of humans.

Which represents the true picture?  Perhaps youth and a naive lack of experience in encountering the universe of everyday conflict is what we discover in the spectrum of opinions; and cynicism abounds upon greater enmeshment and entanglement with the human condition.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who are considering filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, the question often arises as to whom, when and the timing of divulging the intent to file.  As the saying goes, discretion is the greater part of valor; unless there is a compelling reason to do so, limiting the information where relevant; restricting the venue of information to the extent possible; and keeping mum until and unless necessary, should be the guiding principle.

Why?  Because, first and foremost, medical information (which is obviously the primary foundational basis of a Federal disability retirement application) is sensitive in nature, confidential in scope, and entails vast privacy concerns for all.  Further, one never knows how an agency and its representatives may react (thus the charge that human beings are complex in nature), but the predictability of big-mouths and lack of discretion (alas, the corollary charge of simplicity of humans) should restrain and constrain any urge to divulge earlier than necessary.

“Necessary” is the key word, and that applies to people, timing and context of dissemination of such confidential information.

For the Federal and Postal employee contemplating preparing, formulating and filing for OPM Disability Retirement benefits, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, the general rule, always, should be to believe in both contradictory assertions:  Because human behavior is complex and unpredictable, be discreet in revealing information; and because human behavior is simplistic and unimaginative, similarly be discreet and restrained in providing sensitive information.

As one side of a coin is worth just as much as the other, it is best to feel the nature of two faces in a world replete with two-faces.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Filing for OPM Disability Retirement: The Novel Approach

The genre represents the highest form of literature.  Poetry possesses its eccentric beauty; the short story its ease of brevity for the reader to pick up and finish in convenience of time, and thus its popularity; the biography and the epistemologically privileged cousin, the autobiography, its authentic historicity; and others by design of self-promotion, as Truman Capote’s “non-fiction novel” (an oxymoron?).

But the novel is the king of prose; of a narrative form which allows for many rooms in an endless castle of hidden trap doors and secret galleys full of antiquities and doorways yet to be revealed.  Perhaps that is why, used as an adjective, it defines a uniqueness of approach, akin to the traditional use of the word as a noun representing the highest form of art.

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 positional duties with the Federal government or the U.S. Postal Service, engaging in a “novel” idea may be the best and only option left.

Where the medical condition no longer allows for the continuation of one’s career, and yet the Federal or Postal employee believes that he or she can still remain productive in the employment arena, it is indeed a novel approach for a benefit to pay for one’s inability to perform one or more of the essential elements of one’s job, and yet allow concurrently for the Federal or Postal employee to enter into the private sector, obtain a second vocation, and make up to 80% of what one’s former position currently pays.

For the Federal or Postal employee who is considering 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, it is precisely that allowance of continuation of productivity which fairly recognizes that there is not necessary incompatibility between a medical condition and contribution of talents.

Like the novel genre and the novel idea, they both acknowledge the penultimate value of human creativity, and allow for the characters to develop in the unfolding saga of a story yet untold.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire