Medical Retirement for Federal Workers: Stronger/Weaker

It is a categorization at the most basic level — one that is seen daily in Nature and reflected in the human narrative of historical tides and tragedies.  The stronger dominate the weaker; the latter submits to the former, or flees in terror or dies while trying.

In modernity, the password that protects one’s technological contraption is determined for sufficiency based upon that most basic of identities: stronger or weaker.  The bully on the playground will scan the potentiality for complete dominance at the beginning of each school year, based upon the appearance of how one projects one’s self on the very first day.

Throughout the continuum of life’s encounters, no matter how much we may resist becoming pigeonholed into such simplistic bifurcations — whether of our physical stature; our creative energies; our proclivities and mannerisms, etc. — in the end, we all revert back to the foundational elements of our evolutionary ancestors and systematically deem this event or that capacity as either “stronger” or “weaker”.

We like to think that in our advanced state of civilization, such simplistic terms have become muted because of the heightened level of sophistication (i.e., thus the “revenge of the nerds”, where brain overcomes braun); but our true natures nevertheless tend to reveal themselves despite our best efforts to resist.  It is no different in the arena of “the law” than in all other categories.

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 issue of “stronger” versus “weaker” continues to dominate: One’s medical condition places one in the “weaker” position as against the Federal Agency or the Postal Service.

The Federal Agency or the Postal Facility may begin to assert its “stronger” position by a series of adverse actions initiated to establish a paper-trail leading to ultimate termination, including a “Performance Improvement Plan” (otherwise referred to by the acronym, “PIP”); and when the Federal or Postal employee takes the necessary steps in preparing, formulating and filing 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, it is important to try and gain the “stronger” advantage by enhancing, in every way possible, one’s Federal Disability Retirement application.

There are few “slam-dunk” cases when it comes to a Federal Disability Retirement application.  While the applicant may “believe” his or her case cannot possibly be denied — naturally, because the applicant who tries to prepare the case on his or her own is the same person who suffers from the medical condition upon which the Federal Employee Disability Retirement application is based, and so there is lost a sense of “objectivity” as to the strength or weakness of a case — most cases must be assessed on a scale of “Stronger/Weaker”, and such an assessment is based upon the multiplicity of factors analyzed, including: Does the available and current case-law support the application?  Does the medical documentation sufficiently meet the eligibility criteria under the law?  Will the Agency’s portion of the Federal Disability Retirement application undermine the Applicant’s portion, under the law?

In the end, the law itself determines the basis of a Federal Disability Retirement case in its most basic form of whether a case is “stronger” or “weaker”, and to determine that important aspect of assessing and evaluating a case, consultation with a specialist in Federal Disability Retirement Law is a “must” in this world where nature’s disposition towards the Stronger/Weaker bifurcation continues to dominate.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Disability Retirement for Federal Government Employees: Perfection

Can it ever be achieved?  Is our possession of it proof, as Anselm’s Ontological Argument asserts, of the existence of that which we ourselves cannot ever attain?

Perfection as a “goal” is considered “unrealistic”; as a paradigm against which we compare in order to impose a standard or paradigm of success, we often accept as a given; and, with the exception of stereotypical “Tiger Moms” and other unreasonably demanding categories of nightmarish figures unable to ever please or gratify, perfection is merely an unattainable hollow easily moveable within a spectrum of endless sights much like the proverbial movement of goal posts so-named when nearing the end.

Yet, we constantly strive for it, despite the knowledge that it is unachievable and unrealistic, declaring that the nearer we reach towards the boundaries of perfection, the closer we become as gods of lesser heavens.

The Ancients regarded certain physical characteristics as those “perfect” dimensions based upon proportionality of appearance; in modernity, we have dispensed with any such paradigms and instead have elevated acceptance and tolerance as the greater good, thereby negating hurt feelings, unattainable heights and unreachable expectations.

Perfection, as applied to a specific category such as “health”, can yet nevertheless remain relative in terms of acceptability.  Perfect health can never be maintained forever; relatively good health can be sustained for a time; and poor health, once experienced, is like a bad dream that one wishes to be awakened from, lest it turn into a nightmare that never ends.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a deteriorating, progressively chronic condition of a medical nature — one that is likely to last for a minimum of 12 months in preventing or otherwise impacting one’s ability and capacity to perform all of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal job — it may be time to consider preparing, formulating and 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.

Filing for OPM Disability Retirement is not an admission that perfection is an unattainable goal (although we know it is); rather, that merely a particular job or career is not the “right fit” — and in the end, that is the greater perfection of all: To recognize one’s limitations, properly evaluate and assess one’s circumstances, and adjust and modify in accordance thereof.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Medical Retirement under FERS & CSRS: The option of nothing

The path of least resistance is often to simply do nothing.  To make an affirmative choice is sometimes a painful one involving sacrifice and steps taken which will determine an outcome, later to be judged by retrospective insight, as to whether it was the “right” one or a “wrong” one.

To negate, refute or otherwise do the opposite, and to say “no” in the choice-making process, is also an “affirmative” one, if only in the negative sense.  It is still a call made, a judgment asserted, and while the “no” may not be able to arrive at a retrospective viewpoint as to whether it was the “right” one or the “wrong” one (precisely because, in the very negation of making a choice, one may never see any further consequences, but merely a nothingness that prevails from the option to not do that something, which is essentially a double-negative that results in nothing).

The worst option to assume is to allow lapse to occur – to do nothing, neither affirmatively nor negatively, and allow outside circumstances to determine the course of fate.  In taking such a path of least resistance, two things occur: First, you have left it in the hands of circumstances, and failed to take any affirmative steps in the allowance of lapse; and Second, the fact that you will never know it was a good or bad idea to allow for the lapse means that you have forsaken the entire decision-making process, and thus you disengaged yourself from the importance of life’s major participation.

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 Statute of Limitations that imposes a restriction upon post-separation filing is One (1) Year.

Thus, the law is as follows: Upon separation, whether by termination or resignation, of a Federal employee, that Federal employee has up until 1 year to file for Federal Disability Retirement benefits.  If the Federal employee files for Federal Disability Retirement within 364 days of the separation from Federal Service (give yourself at least 1 day, just to be on the safe side), then no harm is done.

If the Federal or Postal employee determines not to file (i.e., a negative – affirmative decision), then so be it, and after the 365th day, that Federal or Postal employee is forever prevented from asserting his or her rights under the Federal Disability Retirement laws, acts, statutes and regulations.

If the Federal or Postal employee simply does nothing – neither making an affirmative or a negative decision, and simply allows for the time to lapse and the opportunity to pass – then the path of least resistance has been taken, with the opportunity to engage in the decision-making process forever lost.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

FERS & CSRS Disability Retirements: Focus away from ‘self’

The heightened problems emanating from a chronic medical condition cannot be quantified; as the medical issues themselves become exacerbated while attempting to work and engage in other “major life activities”, the pain, psychiatric debilitation and interruption of things once taken for granted, become all the more magnified and exponentially exaggerated in significance, relevance and focus of daily contention.  Or, to put it in more common parlance, it makes us grouchier as the day goes.

Federal Disability Retirement is a benefit offered for all FERS employees (and any in the older CSRS system who may still be around – a rarity, like dinosaurs and gnomes of past ages), and is meant as a progressive paradigm of inestimable worth.  Unlike other systems of compensation, it encourages the (former) Federal or Postal employee to seek employment in the private sector, because the generous allowance that the former Federal or Postal employee can make up to 80% of what one’s former salary currently pays, on top of the annuity itself, allows for “the system” to be a self-paying entity, because such individuals then pay taxes and contribute “back into” the very system which is being accessed.

The fact that it is such a thoughtful, progressive system is rare – for, government bureaucracies tend not to embrace an insightful program of wider application, but this is a case in point where the system “works”.

That being said, the Federal or Postal employee who continues to try and extend one’s career in the Federal sector or the U.S. Postal Service by “hoping” – and, do not misunderstand, for hope as an element of human focus for events yet to occur, is a good thing – that the medical condition will get better, and thus to delay initiating the complex process of preparing, formulating and filing 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, does so at the peril of self-focusing immolation.

The point of getting Federal Disability Retirement benefits is just that – to be able to attend to the medical condition itself; to attain restorative sleep; to not be embroiled in the vicious cycle of having to work at a job where one or more of the essential elements of one’s positional duties cannot be met because of the medical condition itself, and therefore a stark reminder, on a daily and sustained basis, upon one’s self, the limiting aspects of the medical condition, and the inability to escape the constant gravitational dissection of “me, myself and I”.  That’s the rub, isn’t it?

As you try and get better, those around you – supervisors, coworkers, etc. – begin to harass, criticize and compound the problem by redirecting your shortcomings resulting from the very medical conditions from which you are trying to get better.  Federal Disability Retirement is the next step in that process – where, once attained, the stress of focusing upon one’s self is relieved by being able to actually focus upon what is important:  one’s health, and the pathway to a secure future through getting approved for Federal Disability Retirement benefits.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Federal Employee Disability Retirement: Games

It is primarily a form of play or sport; but in other contexts, used as a verb, it can imply or denote the manipulation of rules in order to attain a result through unfair or unscrupulous means.  As a sport, some engage in the competitive aspects of life itself, outside of the boundaries of organized or even recognized activity — as in playing “mind games” or harassment for purposes of torturing and victimizing.

Fiefdoms tend to encourage that sort of gamesmanship; and while Feudal Lords no longer exist in an official capacity, they continue to pervade through vestiges of barbarity concealed in the cosmetic niceties of polite society.

Perhaps, in some form during the Darwinian lineage of evolutionary survivorship, when brute strength alone resulted in the genetic alterations through environmental forces necessitating unrelenting characteristics in the expansion of the species, the voice of reason was lost, the soul of empathy extinguished, and the fathomless essence of humanity became a whisper of past hopes and bottomless faithlessness in epochs forever forgotten.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, the “game” of harassment, intimidation and unremitting stress piled on in order to test the outer limits of tolerance, is but a daily occurrence no stranger to the fiefdom of yore.  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 positional duties, will need to make a decision in the process of such encounters with coworkers, Supervisors and Managers:  to remain in that “game” of no returns, or to exit and move onto other and more fruitful activities.

Filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, is a means of moving on with life.

Study history for a few moments, and one can see the barbarism of the past; study it for a considerable pastime, and one can comprehend the loss of hope for the present; study it for a lifetime, and one may see the faint glimmer of light for one’s future.  For, as life is not merely a game, but more of an endeavor beyond mere survival, so recognizing that cutting one’s losses before the game’s end is often the smartest move, and that includes preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through OPM, when the time is ripe and necessary, as in the “now” of forever tomorrow.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

FERS & CSRS Disability Retirement: Cosmic Intransigence

The complaint is most often heard in a converse manner — that because of the minutiae and daily details required of one’s energy, focus and concentration, the “larger picture” fails to be seen.  But the reverse is just as true:  we often overlook the significance of the mundane, justifying such neglect by arguing that it is the cosmic and universal principles which are of greater relevance; mere human beings within the aegis of humanity, are but flies in a smattering of a decaying universe.

And while grand principles are indeed noble, and provide for paradigms upon which notable historical movements have been based, it is ultimately the monotony of hopes and dreams, as held and projected by youth in turmoil and wanting, which create the sprinkling of golden dust blowing by to sparkle the dreariness of daily toil.  The cosmic will always be intransigent; there is nothing to be done with it, as natural laws, the fate of karmic forces, and the ethereal foundations of the universe will continue to move history, economies and world events forward, with or without the input of ordinary people.

The world is a mere playground for the wealthy and powerful, and the gods which play with the cosmos are already intransigent in their own brutal way.  But that is precisely why the personal problems of individuals amount to so much more than the aggregate of a single life; the “greater picture” will always be there; it is the seemingly insignificant life which makes for beauty and worth.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who become disheartened because of the cosmic intransigence of the “greater picture”, it is precisely the focus upon one’s own life, family, future and time yet left for greater endeavors, which should be the focus of today, the dream of tomorrow and the concentrated efforts of past remembrances.  When a medical condition begins to impact one’s capacity and ability to perform the essential elements of one’s positional duties, the Federal or Postal employee needs to consider filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits, precisely because the “larger picture” will always be there, but the smaller details of necessity call for one’s effort in securing one’s place in that greater context.

When one’s health is threatened, the fragile nature of one’s being, the sense of insignificance and loss of place and relevance in society, becomes overwhelming.  But it is precisely within that context that the importance of carrying the burden forth becomes all the more relevant; if not for grander principles, then at least for one’s own self, family, and friends who care.

Filing for Federal Disability Retirement through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management may seem like another mundane detail of bureaucratic life which one must pursue, but it is what one can do in the next phase of one’s life that will matter, while all the while the cosmic intransigence of an impervious universe coldly stares back with the laughter of fate and determination to destroy.  It is up to each of us to defy such willfulness of intransigence.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Federal Employee Disability Retirement: Survival

The struggle to get through a given day can be overwhelming.  The complexity of the human phenomenon is beyond mere comprehension; and, as some mysteries are simply unsolvable, so the accepted view of evolutionary will for survivability is defied daily.  Can it really be explained by a language game encapsulating “instinct”, “genetic determinism” and “innate desire to propagate one’s species“?

Such a language game is tantamount to Popper’s falsifiability axiom; it falls into the category of a nice story, and even believable, but no historical data to test its veracity.  Each day is an extreme test of Nietzsche’s calculus of one’s will to live; and, by the way, it is always other people who truly compel the test.

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 one’s positional duties, the endurance of survivability is a test of daily will.  What makes it tougher?  It is a question of relativity, of course.

The increasing pressure from the agency for greater productivity was barely bearable before the advent of the medical condition, or its manifested symptoms exacerbated recently; the sudden whispers and glances askance when exiting or entering a room; and the cyclical viciousness of wondering what next the agency will do, is contemplating, or conniving, as the case may be.

Filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, may not look like the “be-all” solution in every case; but where the clash of survivability and the lowering of one’s stature within the Federal agency or the U.S. Postal Service from one of “golden boy (or girl, as the case may be)” to “questionable”, then the proverbial writing on the wall may necessitate the preparation of an “exit strategy” from the war zone of predators.

In the end, the anthropological account of man as merely one animal among others, and the predatory environment characterized by the paradigm, “survival of the fittest“, is both believable and compelling.

Hobbs, Rousseau and Locke were precursors in their literary genius of bifurcating the condition into that of “state of nature” and “civil society”, and we can still fool ourselves within the surroundings of technology and architectural wonders, that we are somehow above the beasts of burden, and other amoebas and prehistoric entities; but like tumors and other things that grow, survival cannot be the standard of living; otherwise, staying put would be the way to go.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire