FERS Disability Retirement Attorney Help: Chaos

Age is revealed by the things we relate to.  The word or supposed acronym KAOS — for those old enough — immediately evokes the old and original “Get Smart” series, of an equally inept spy ring (obviously Russian or Eastern European) as the nemesis of the American CIA, both paralleling in their bilateral ridiculousness, both engaging in child-like behavior originating from childhood fantasies of intrigue and secrecy.

But “chaos” itself is no laughing matter.  The thin line between sanity and chaos is a fragile one.  The Greek derivation of the word is borrowed from “abyss” — that emptiness that exists before the Biblical intervention of a Deus ex Machina, where the human abyss is suddenly intervened with a supernatural being who orders the world and resolves all conflicts.  But that such things happened in the “real world” we all must contend with.

In that real world, we all live in the artifice of appearances: Seemingly, there is a happy family, but suddenly, that middle class semblance of happiness is shaken when the spouse finds out that his “till death do us part” partner is having an affair with someone else; or the order of life is unravelling because of some addiction — to pornography, to gambling, to drinking, or to drugs; or, suddenly, a suicide occurs — of a spouse, a child, or other family member; or abuse is occurring, suddenly revealed; and so, chaos enters a life previously thought to be sane, ordered, and manicured beyond reproach.

Disabling injuries or diseases can do that, as well.  What was once “managed”, can suddenly wreak havoc over the life of a well-ordered individual.  That is when a medical condition, for a Federal employee or Postal worker, can become the line-crossing event which propels one into recognizing that there is a need to file for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, under FERS.

Chaos is not so far from the ordered life we believe we possess.  When that recognition occurs, contact a FERS Disability Attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law, and begin the process of preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal Employee or Postal Disability Retirement application, in order to pull you back from the abyss of chaos, back to a time of sanity and ordered quietude.

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 Law: Remnants of One’s Self

Remnants, fragments, shadows, a mere ghostly memory — of one’s self; or of one’s former self.  They are all concepts which evoke images: of a past which was once you; a present which is only a part of; a future which is uncertain as to whether you will again become your former self, remain as you are as a mere remnant; or, somewhere in the middle, where you are never what you were before, but you have gained some semblance of your former self.

Medical conditions often determine those issues: They debilitate; they progressively rob; they worsen and deplete; and when you are a Federal or Postal employee and the remnant of one’s self can no longer perform one or more of the essential elements of what you still are required to do in your Federal or Postal job, then it is time to consider filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management under FERS.

Contact an OPM Disability Retirement Attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law, and consider regaining some remnant of your former self.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Postal & Federal Employee Disability Retirement: The shape of reality

Does it really have a shape?  Yes, yes, of course it is a “dimensional” world where there is depth, height, width, volume, and all sorts of “stuff” in between — and “form” differentiates and distinguishes between various “beings” such that there is not a “oneness” of Being; but beyond that, does “reality’ have a shape, and is it different for each of us?

Of course, the natural follow-up question concerns whether we can ourselves “shape” reality — used as transitive verb and not as a noun — as opposed to encountering reality “as it is” and merely accepting its trueness of Being.  Is Kant correct in that the categories of the human psyche form the perceptual reality that surrounds us and, if so, is it different for each of us?  Do the mentally ill merely have a different “shape of reality” as opposed to “normal” individuals with healthy psyches?

How is reality shaped — does our eyesight make a difference?  Do the blind have a different shape of reality because they must depend more upon tactile experiences which determines their space within a darkness of extension and volume?  If we could smell colors and see scents, would the shape of reality be altered?  Does language modify the reality we perceive, and in modernity, has Facebook, Twitter and Instagram radically transformed the very essence of reality’s shape?  And does a medical condition modify one’s shape of reality, as well?

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 shape of reality must include various encounters with alternative universes that may previously have been unthought of — as such shapes of reality that may include the preparation, formulation and filing of an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, to be filed with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.

It is, indeed, a different shape of reality: One must think about a life and career apart from the Federal or Postal sector; and while such shapes may change, such realities must be adapted to, and the one constant in life is the essence of who you are, what you have become, and the idea that you can still shape reality into the realness based upon the shape that you are in today.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

Federal Disability Retirement: Circumstances and choices

When is it too late to begin reflecting upon one’s circumstances and choices?  Do we already do that daily, and does the length of rumination engaged depend upon where one’s station in life has reached? Do old men and squeaky rocking chairs justify such reflective modes of behavior, or do the young as well take the time to ponder upon choices made, circumstances encountered, and the spectrum of clashes in between?

Do we formulate a fauna of false representations of ourselves, and depict upon the screen of a mind’s inner movie of the “self” with edited versions so that, when queried, we can make those “bad mistakes” of past choices appear to fit into circumstances where we can innocently declare, “I had no other choice!”?  We “make the bed we lie in”; suffer from the “messes we make of our lives”; or of what other adage or declarative falsehoods may we come up with to excuse our own choices in life’s travail of valleys full of mournful echoes?

Circumstances often dictate the choices we make; or, at least the metaphor of “dictation” leads us to believe.  For, the very idea of “X dictates Y” as in the previous statement, “Circumstances dictate the choices we make”, removes us of the responsibility in making the choice, by making it appear as if the choice made is not really a choice at all, but merely an action that is necessitated and you are therefore merely an unwilling agent.

What is lost in such discourse, of course, is the lengthy history of sub-choices previously presented and ignored, where choices that could have been made before circumstances became so dire that the narrowing of alternatives dissipated until a crisis point came to the fore — that is where circumstances and choices require careful analysis before the alternative juncture of varying pathways disappear.

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, whether under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, it is important to early on recognize the circumstances unfolding and the choices presented, before the multitude of “forks in the road” begin to disappear, and life’s circumstances begin to impose — not binary choices — but choices that begin to dictate.

Preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management may not seem like a choice that one wants to undertake, but it is often the circumstances that one has no control over that dictates the future course of choices, and not the choices themselves.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Legal Representation on Federal Disability Retirement Claims: False notions

We all possess them; some, more than others; most, of a harmless variety where — so long as they are kept private and unannounced like an illegitimate child kept from the knowledge of one’s spouse, friends and family — no consequences ensue from the mere “having” of them.  False notions can take many forms, and on the spectrum of held beliefs, so long as one never “acts” upon them or otherwise expresses them in polite society, they remain the eccentric uncle that visits periodically but for short stays, and always tries to remain unobtrusive.

Say a person believes that the earth is flat — yes, there are many such people, to the extent that there are contingents of “flat earth societies” cropping up everywhere — but moreover, not only that the earth is flat, but you also believe that martians live on the far side of the moon, that every book published in the world over is written by Shakespeare, and that there is truly a wizard of Oz that controls the mechanism of the universe.  What harm is there in believing any of those?

Perhaps some are false notions; perhaps others are not.  So long as they do not intersect with conversations in the public domain, or do not interfere in the daily activities of living one’s life, is there any harm to possessing, maintaining, retaining and ascribing to false notions?

Take it a step further, however, and insert the following hypothetical: At a “get together” with coworkers and other departmental or other office personnel, a conversation begins with a group of gathered men and women, and someone begins talking about a new book that has just been reviewed by the New York Times Book Review Section, and one of the individuals pipes in that it, too, was written by Shakespeare.

The first person says, “No, no, it was written by so-and-so”, but the second individual persists and insists, and an argument starts: “No, it was written by Shakespeare.”  “You’re crazy.”  “No, you don’t know a thing!”  “And you probably believe that the earth is flat.”  And on and on.  Now, the next day, everyone is back at work — has anything changed?

Holding on to the false notions has not disrupted the flow of productivity, and the fact that one’s false notions were inserted unnecessarily into the daily discourse of other’s beliefs and understanding of an individual, has not disrupted the objective universe of those who gained further knowledge of another’s belief system.  False notions, then, so long as they remain private, or even when inserted into the public domain but without objective interference, may remain unobtrusive.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers, however, who suffer from a medical condition, such that the medical condition is beginning to prevent the Federal or Postal worker from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal job, a false notion can indeed have some deleterious consequences.

If you, as a Federal or Postal employee, possess a false notion of pride, or of loyalty to the Agency or the Postal Service at the expense of your health, and thus delay preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether as a FERS, CSRS or CSRS-Offset employee, the impact of further delay or procrastination can impact your health.

False notions are fine to foolhardily have fun with, but when it intersects with your health, it is time to prepare, formulate and file an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, to be filed with OPM.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire 
OPM Disability Retirement Attorney

    

FERS & CSRS Disability Retirement: Retaining innocence in modernity

Is it even possible?  Moreover, what would such a state of Being be like, in contrast to the conceptual entanglements in the aggregate as defined, say, 50 – 100 – 200 years ago?  For, as deviancy has been defined downwards in an uncontrollable spiral of destructiveness, so the very concept of “innocence” has altered in meaning, tone and implications, has it not?

Is “innocence” now merely the absence of cynicism, or perhaps a greater form of naiveté?  Is lack of sophistication the same as being in a state of innocence, and if the latter is lost, does it necessarily mean the consumption of the former as well?  Can one shelter a child today, anymore than one can “find” a rare discovery in an antique shop or a yard sale – for, with the Internet and the capacity of everyone to immediately establish the value of an item, can one really “discover” anything new, anymore than one can retain innocence in modernity?

Perhaps, instead of the concept of “retaining” – which implies that which one once possessed, then lost – the better avenue of investigation would be in discussing the possibility of “attaining” – where an admission is made of a foregone conclusion that the yesteryears of innocence can no longer be repossessed.

Where, once children were sent out into the woods with sticks imagined as Civil War weapons, and bullets whizzed by and grazed an arm and death was but a dramatic fall after an imagined battle pitched against the heroism of the Great War now forgotten or the Second One that was the defeating of the forces of evil; now, replaced with drone strikes, terrorism and massive shootings where political correctness cannot even allow the child to engage in pitched battles, let alone pitchforks that no one possesses anymore as a relic of the past, because now the Smartphone, the Internet, the email and the Instagram have replaced the human interaction we once relished but now dispossess and discard as human detritus of inestimable degradation of worth; and so it goes.

So the question comes full circle back to:  Is retaining innocence in modernity even a serious question?  Likely, not.  Instead, we must each, each of us, formulate a paradigm of self-worth; of who we are; of where we came from; and determine to chart a course of “right” living.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who are subjected to a daily barrage of harassment and antagonistic behavior in the workplace because of a medical condition that prevents the Federal or Postal worker from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal job, the pathway to retaining some semblance of innocence in modernity may be to prepare an effective Federal OPM 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.

For, to stay will be to become a bitter and defeated jumble of cynicism with an endless chasm of turmoil; to seek help in the process by turning to an experienced attorney in order to obtain a Federal Disability Retirement benefit, then to exit the Federal workforce in order to focus upon the priority of one’s health, is to declare to the world:  I may not be able to retain innocence in modernity, but that doesn’t mean I have to play the fool, either.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Federal Employee Disability Retirement: Conversation of one

Are we the only species which engages in it?  Do we ever see a dog standing aside and participating in such a phenomena?  Or a cardinal pausing in its morning melody of exuberant sing-song in order to address a non-existent other?  And, it isn’t even an artifice or convention for which the actor is being paid, as in an “aside” or a “soliloquy” where private thoughts are spoken aloud for the benefit of the audience, but where others in the drama act “as if” such thoughts are unspoken and shared not.

But we engage in such dialogues of diatribes:  with friends whom we practice in order to share; of spouses concerning the most intimate of matters; of bosses and coworkers to whom we failed to respond at the crucial moment, but now vent by a conversation of one of that which we wished we had said, desired to rebut, and cared to ponder.

The proverbial quip, of course, is that we are “okay” so long as we have such unilateral dialogues; it is only if the imaginary “other” begins to respond, that we then must consider the state of our own sanity.  But such colloquies occur daily, and throughout life; in quiet moments of reflective self-searching; of what we “would” have said, could have uttered, and in retrospective fashion, desired to have conveyed.

The conversation of one is often never shared; once exhaustively vented, it withers away like the ashes from a once-roaring bonfire, consuming all of the human detritus piled in anger, disgust and resentful remorse, then with watchful eyes applauded as the engulfing flames consume the aggregation of the collective angers, hurts and inflicted bruises of a shattered inner self.  It is sometimes the tool in preparation for a necessary confab; or an exchange with a worthy opponent; and where ad libbing without proper preparation is acknowledged to result in likely disaster.

The conversation of one — we have all had them; with parents and siblings; of sons and fathers; and for cardinals who chirp in the morning glory of a dew-filled mist in the obscured world of linguistic artifices constructed upon vacuity of purpose, it is the beauty of a filled universe without the complexities of human drama unfolding, that makes for worth and value.

For the Federal employee and U.S. Postal worker who suffers from a medical condition, however, the need to have that conversation of one is often a prerequisite precisely because medical conditions comprise the most private of concerns, and absolute confidentiality must be adhered to and the strictest of trust kept.

Attorneys have an inviolable rule for trust, confidence and confidentiality, and privacy concerns should never be a question.  At some point, that conversation of one needs to be expanded to include an exchange involving proper medical documentation, the statutory criteria, the legal strategy to pursue, and the content and context of what must be included in order to prepare, formulate and file for an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, to be submitted to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.

Preparing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application through OPM, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, will often begin with a conversation of one, and that is understandable; but if it remains a mere soliloquy, as in a Shakespearean play where each in an audience believes that he or she is the sole soul who heard it, then it will remain merely as the unconquered thoughts of countless past warriors who gave up lives for a cause left in futility, and where the present is never confronted, and the future left unsecured.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

OPM Disability Retirement: Independence Day

Each country with a colonial past celebrates it; though, for some, separation may not have been accomplished through violent revolution, but via natural evolution by decoupling of cultural and economic ties.  Then, of course, there are individual demarcations of personal milestones; of becoming an adult; of the first habitat away from childhood memories; or even a first paycheck replacing the dependency of an allowance bundled in caveats of emotional connections veiled in subtle admonitions of responsibilities, adolescent resentments and the proverbial cutting of the lawn by a weekend warrior.

Time normally takes care of such sophomoric interludes, and replaces those seemingly significant torch-passings with other, more relevant and impactful events.  We tend to place great metaphysical significance upon a particular day, as the cornerstone and marker representing a transcendent relevance, and all the while allow for the symbols to disintegrate in the tatters of modern decay.

Revolutions rarely attain the goals sought; for, it is the days and decades thereafter which matter, in daily preserving an unextinguished light which remains fragile and dimming but for patriots who sacrifice for naught.  Clubs and associations form, like cottage industries propagated by deliberate avenues of greedy excess; the daughters or sons of this or that revolution, and lineage becomes of importance, while the names of unmarked souls lying anonymously beneath the bloodied soils where trumpets once blared and orders fulfilled, and the dying screams of sons crying out for motherless children left in the poverty of a forgotten past, fade as memories and the aged pass on.

Can a people who remembers not the dates of demarcating moments last for long?  Must nations celebrate in order to garner the enthusiasm of civic pride, or can mere greed, money grubbing endeavors make up for loss of flag waving and patriotic fervor?  In the end, it is how we treat the most vulnerable and weak, which reflects upon the ardor of our sincerity.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, and who must file 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 question of independence is a significant one — for it is a turning away from that which continues to harm, whether through greater stresses upon the body, mind or emotional stability; and the severing of ties is a real one, and not just a symbolic quiver in a parade of trumpets and gleeful shouts; no, Independence Day for the Federal or Postal employee who successfully maneuvers through the bureaucratic maze of an administrative nightmare in order to attain a Federal Disability Retirement annuity, is a day indeed of significance and import.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Medically Retiring from Federal Government: Environmental Toxicity

We read about it in the print and other media; the global nature of the problem, the haunting images of rusting barrels and canisters with leaking liquids of foreign and unidentifiable hues of chemical mixtures; of stories involving deformed babies and cognitive delay, with early onset of dementia causally related to the drinking water, air pollution and osmosis of agents otherwise harmful.  Science Fiction writers employ the genre of antiseptic cities of artificial constructs, with men and women who venture out into the tainted world in white suits of sealed purity, breathing through tubes and oxygenated rasps barely audible through the thick materials of protective immunity.

China, we are told, basks in the careless disregard of deliberate destruction, with India lagging not too far behind, and then the “developing” countries; that the airstream, jet stream and water streams are all connected, like tentacles which relate back to the organic essence of human existence, and unless little old “me” and “I” and the pointed finger of accusatory mumblings does “his part” or “your part” in reducing all that mess that the proverbial “we” have created, that doom is just around the corner accompanied by “gloom” preceding its cousin; and so we laboriously cart our plastic bottles and milk cartons into larger and larger bins that have logos we proudly think represents the advancement and modernity of our thoughtfulness, and watch as the powerful jet set in private planes and get transported in SUVs that spew out untold tons of unseen pollutants in order to congregate and discuss the fate of the universe, the represented country, the state, the community and lil ol’ me.

Environmental toxicity, of course, is a real problem; it is the lip service paid by those who preach without actionable lives of verified sincerity which presents a problem for most.  And for the rest of us, the “little people” who matter not and impact insignificantly upon the global scale of policy interventions, there are multiple dimensions of the term itself — as in the quality of the workplace, the manner in which the employer treats employees, and in the Federal sector and the U.S. Postal Service, the application of relevance for the conceptual compound of the two words often implies more than the physical universe of occupied space; it involves the harassment, emotional abuse and hostility of purpose.

For the Federal employee and U.S. Postal worker who suffers from a medical condition, such that the medical condition compels the Federal or Postal employee to file 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 question of environmental toxicity is just that — not the wasteful plastics otherwise disregarded and discarded into the trash bin, but the real impact of a caustic atmosphere empowering little minds within fiefdoms of medieval power centers.

How the Federal agency treats “lil ol’ me”, and what the U.S. Postal Service does to its employees by requiring and forcing abusive repetition of physical labor, goes well beyond what the ordinary person cares about in China, India, et al.; instead, they want you to look beyond the window of your own house, even as the smoke fills and the fires blaze in the very neighborhood you live in.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire