FERS Disability Retirement Law: The Great Lesson

Once upon a time, people went through experiences without the need to put them to some greater advantage.

Stories abound of WWI and WWII veterans who earned medals for bravery — even the Medal of Honor — and never mentioned it to anyone, until some grandchild wandering up into Grandpa’s attic found a shiny ornament in some dusty old chest, brought it down and asked the old man, “What is this?”  Or, of the Olympic Gold Medalist who similarly went to work, got married and lived a “normal”, unassuming life without make a big todo about his or her accomplishment of being the top athlete in a chosen field.

Nowadays, everyone who experiences anything has to turn it into The Great Lesson.  It becomes an awakening; a springboard to some Eureka moment that propels the person into a higher purpose, a metaphysical transcendence to attaining a greater consciousness, and then to become a corporate motivational speaker who has some profound insight into life, its misgivings and that “Great Lesson” that was allegedly learned from some traumatic experience or other.

The reality is that, the greater lesson beyond any “great lesson” is that the experience itself — whatever it is — is not the hard part; the hard part is to go beyond that experience, and to continue to live a quiet, productive life without trying to sell to everyone how “The Great Lesson” lead you to profound, metaphysical insights which corporate motivational speakers can charge an arm and a leg to hear about.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a disabling 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 Great Lesson of a medical condition is quite simple, and will not get you to some metaphysical consciousness beyond the simplicity of the lesson itself:  Get a Federal Disability Retirement annuity, and begin to focus upon the priority of your health.

There — that’s all there is to it.  Of course, maybe you can package it into some extended motivational speech and make up to 80% of what your former Federal job pays today, so that you can WOW them with some transcendental meditational speech and charge them that arm and a leg, but only after you have regained your health.

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: Places We Don’t Want to Be

Of actual places, or even of situations — of places we don’t want to be or circumstances we would rather not find ourselves in — of which we never think about.

It is interesting that the human mind gravitates toward the positive — Of places we would like to visit, books we would like to read, people we would like to meet, etc.  Is that the power of “positive thinking”, or of daydreams relishing the imagination filling the void which otherwise haunts our lives?

Sometimes, however, it is fruitful — and even necessary — to consider the potential negatives which may loom upon the horizon in order to prepare for contingencies in the event of a calamity.

The Federal or Postal worker would rather not contemplate a future in which he or she is no longer able to perform one or more of the essential elements of his or her job; or, there may come a time when your agency places you on a Performance Improvement Plan and initiates actions which leads to a removal — all, places you don’t want to be, but must consider.

Perhaps filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits under FERS is a place you would rather not be — but again, it may be necessary to consider.

For those places you don’t want to be, contact an OPM Disability Lawyer who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement benefits, which is actually the first step in moving towards a place where you may actually want to be — of receiving a retiree annuity for OPM Disability Retirement benefits under FERS.

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.

 

Office of Personnel Management (OPM) Disability Retirement: Divide and Conquer

Perhaps it is not any one medical condition, alone which prevents the Federal or Postal employee from performing one’s Federal or Postal position; rather, the aggregation and combination of multiple conditions — of depression combined with chronic migraines; or back pain along with panic attacks and severe anxiety, etc. — prevents the Federal or Postal employee from performing all of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal position.

The U.S. Office of Personnel Management — the Federal Agency which reviews and makes the decision for an approval or a denial on all Federal Disability Retirement applications — is fully aware of this, but proceeds to divide and isolate each medical condition, minimizing the impact of that specific condition without taking into account the intersecting impact of all other medical conditions, and thereby denies the Federal Disability Retirement application by ignoring the aggregation and combined impact of one’s entirety of health concerns.

This is the age-old military maneuver of divide and conquer — divide and isolate the enemy’s flanks, then attack each individual and isolated division one by one until each are conquered separately and individually.  It is a tactic used by OPM in many cases, and done successfully — until and unless there is a counterattack utilizing and applying OPM laws governing Federal Disability Retirement benefits.

Contact an OPM Lawyer who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law, and begin to put together the strategy to counter OPM’s “Divide and Conquer” approach to Federal Disability Retirement Law.

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.

 

Medical Retirement for Federal Employees: The World We Create

It is a Kantian question which always remains a riddle: Of the extent to which our cognitive structures impose and mold the world around us; of the objective world that impinges and forces us to conform; and between the two, somehow, “reality” is encountered.

The world we “create” cannot be too far outside the periphery of the objective world; otherwise, the objective world will deem us insane and place you into protective custody — whether on the notion that you will potentially be a harm to yourself, or to others.  Thus, any world that we create must be within certain boundaries.

We cannot, for instance, create a reality where buses do not exist when we cross the street; but we can create one where outside intrusions are minimized, while riding a bus, by putting earphones on and listening to music, the news, etc.  We can create havens of respite, where we confine ourselves to our homes for a time in order to escape the stresses of the outer world; but we cannot seclude ourselves forever, because the reality of needing to interact with the outer world becomes, at some point, a social necessity.

Filing for Federal Disability Retirement under FERS is a way of creating our own world; for, the Federal or Postal employee who can no longer perform all of the essential elements of his or her job must still survive, and obtaining a Federal Disability Retirement annuity allows for a lifestyle to be maintained and a career to begin in another world we create.

Consult with an attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law, and investigate the reality of the world we create — different from the one as presently lived.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

OPM Disability Retirement under FERS: The Kettle’s Whistle

Why do we invent such irritating devices?  When the jarring whistle of the kettle’s boil screeches to gain our attention, is it precisely for that reason — in order to remind us that there is water boiling, that a fire or burner is causing it, and that you cannot just leave it like allowing for the needle on a record-player to turn endlessly upon a music-less disc with soft scratches upon a rotation that is going nowhere (ah, those days when music was truly enjoyed!).

Are noises created to always reflect the reality of its source?  Does the sound of the waives match the soft lapping of the ocean’s beauty, just as the raging storm’s fury mirrors the torrent of rain and thunder?  When first a child hears the sound of a distant train, and only later sees the monstrosity that forms the engine and the caboose, does he or she reflect, “Well, that certainly didn’t turn out to be what I thought” —? Similarly, does pain match the warning of a body’s injury?  Does a voice that sounds purring parallel the gruffness of a wrestler’s weight?

If the kettle’s whistle is meant to irritate and to alarm, it is doing its job; and the kettle that fails to so whistle is one that has lost its purpose and utility, even though it still boils as well as the next one purchased in replacement of the one which lost its capacity to irritate.

Medical conditions are like that, as well — of the capacity to alarm, to trigger warnings, to possess a reason thereof.  We resist it; of the voice that says that change needs to be forthcoming.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal employees 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 his or her Federal or Postal job, it may be that the kettle’s whistle is warning of an impending need — of a change.

Getting up, taking the kettle off of the burner and stopping the whistle is akin to preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management under FERS: For, in the end, the kettle’s whistle is merely the warning we needed, prompting us to act when all around us are indicators that what once was can no longer be.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Attorney for Federal Disability Retirement Claims: The Whisper of Discontent

Seasons come and go; it is one of those ponderous “throw-away” lines that people utter without much thought, somewhat akin to the customary “hello, how are you” declarative that is stated without a pause as the speaker rushes quickly past without waiting for an answer.

Yes, and there are also winters of discontent — borrowed from the line in Shakespeare’s Richard III, and also, by happenstance, the title of the last novel by John Steinbeck; but more often, it is the whispers of discontent that prevail more pervasively, for “discontent” is not necessarily a lasting emotion, or even one that endures for a season; rather, it is whispered precisely because of its fluctuating characteristic.

We whisper it because we know that, like seasons and emotions, time may heal and further time will alter it; and others may whisper it because the fleeting nature of it may not stand the test of objectivity.  And when the whispers of discontent turn and become the louder shouts of adversity, we often failed to listen carefully and instead ignored the voices that forewarned of foreboding toils.

Medical conditions have a tendency to provide such preludes, as well.  One often knows well before a doctor tells us, whether and to what extent the chronicity and severity of the condition foretells; and whether and to what extent the impact upon one’s Federal or Postal career will be.

The law concerning Federal Disability Retirement requires that the medical condition must “last at least 12 months” — but that does not mean that one must endure a 12-month period of suffering before filing a Federal Disability Retirement application; rather, that the treating doctor or medical provider must provide a prognosis that the medical condition will last, at a minimum, that length of time.

For the Federal or Postal employee who is considering filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, the whisper of discontent comes about with the realization that the medical condition suffered is impacting upon one’s career by preventing the Federal or Postal employee from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s job.

Although seasons do indeed come and go, and there may well be winters of discontent, the Federal or Postal employee who hears one’s Federal Agency or the Postal Service whisper utterances of discontent, may deem it advisable to begin to prepare an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, to be filed with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, before such whispers become a winter of discontent where the avalanche of a proposed removal becomes initiated.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Medical Retirement from Federal Government: The whiles of life

While I wait; while I watch; while I listen; while I suffer; these, and many more, are the wiles of life (note the sudden extraction of the “h” in the subtle – or not – alteration by omission).  But such a linguistic subterfuge is appropriate, as it connotes a manipulative intention in the very wasting away of life’s gifts.  For, indeed, we spend much of our days steeped in inactivity, waiting patiently while life passes by.

While I wait in line; while I watch an advertisement; while the kids play; while the dog sniffs; the wiles of waiting, allowing for thoughts to wander afar into daydream’s decaying of time, purpose, value and worth in a traversing universe that no longer believes in anything but the self-satisfaction of bygone faith.  Does an impervious existence that traps us within a cocoon of timeless nothingness allow room for a Being of teleological foundation?

Can a person withstand substance each minute, without the interruptions and interludes of thoughtless void, where activity of accomplishment is momentarily suspended and purposeless repetition of mundane impotence fails to make forward progress, as the bane of life lures, deceives, entices – again, the very wiles of living?

Heidegger, of course, based the foundation of his philosophy upon the whiles of life – for, all projects of human activity was an avoidance with the fullness of encounter with Being – of engaging in meaningless discourses in order to avert our thoughts upon the ultimate meaning of life; that of death.  For, as fruition and maturation inevitably results in the consequence of decay and destruction, so the linguistic justifications we empower – that such-and-such is delayed “while” this-and-that occurs, or those what-nots have to be in place “while” the doo-dads first come upon us, and other such inane events of uneventful percolates.

The world has now, however, been turned upside down.  The whiles of life have become the centrality of purpose, and perhaps it is the wiles of life that have caused this inverse principle of peripheral insignificance and irrelevance.  It was once thought that one took out one’s Smart phone “while” we waited upon the activity of substantive discourse; now, it is precisely that which occupies most of our time, and the “rest of it” all has become of irrelevant disproportionality, and just an irritation to the essence of who we have become.

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 positional duties in the Federal agency or the U.S. Postal Service, it is important to circumvent both the wiles of the agency, and understand the whiles of preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application.

The wiles of the agency should always make the Federal or Postal employee suspicious – and as a Federal or Postal employee, you have had to contend with it throughout your career.

Now, however, it is time to switch and pivot (as the current, oft-used phrase is repetitively heard), and consider what will be done while you prepare an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, while you wait for the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether you are under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, and while you continue to attend to your medical conditions while still with the agency, or while you are being proposed for a removal.

The whiles of life are many; the key is to circumvent the wiles while real time makes life barely bearable.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

OPM Disability Retirement Annuity: The mindset resulting in a witch’s brew

We can often dismiss antiquity with ease by relegating personalities to caricatures and stereotypes.  Thus, of the Crusaders, that they were merely simple folk unsophisticated in the evolutionary Darwinism of modernity; of Roman legions, fearful of punishment and brought up to bear the cruelty of his environment; or even of more recent vintage, the gunslinger out West — of Billy the Kid or Wild Bill Hickok, where legend surpasses the individual and becomes fact.

But a slight alteration of a vantage point can skew the perspective; and thus, when we focus upon the cauldron of the witch’s brew, as opposed to the personality who stirs and skims the steaming pot and tastes with a silent laugh the compilation of herbs, incantations and bones of lizards extinct but for the ghostly aura of a hand which discovers the mist of superstition, then we begin to truly understand the nature of human beings.

Even the modern day “curandera”, or traditional healer who must speak to the Andean underworld and mix the exacting drops of bat’s blood and seek out the plants and herbs in the harsh mountainous enclaves, possesses an aura of mystery unable to be discerned, unless one averts the eyes from the window of the soul and instead transposes upon the metal source from whence the steam arises.  Then, there in the transfixed embrace switching from the deepened riverbeds of facial ravines of the one whom we cannot comprehend, and corners instead upon the objectified universe out of the contextual historicity of predetermined ideas, we begin to understand.

We put faith in others, and repetitively so, and when the self-flagellation wrought by dependence upon the kindness of others is crushed beneath the weight of rejection and rebuttal, then and only then are we able to “move on” and pick ourselves back up in order to advance towards goals abandoned and dreams unfulfilled.

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 realizing the fruition of one’s career as a Federal or Postal employee, and must by necessity forego the compensatory benefits of job, career, TSP build-up and years of in-service accumulation; it is, then, time to consider 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.

Once a Federal Disability Retirement annuity is obtained, the time that one is receiving a OPM Disability Retirement annuity counts towards the total number of years of Federal Service, so that when recalculation occurs when the Federal or Postal employee reaches age 62, those years of Federal Service while receiving the Federal Disability Retirement annuity counts towards the recalculated annuity.

But first, the refocus of one’s perspective must occur, in order to alter the mindset from whence to proceed.

The Federal employee or U.S. Postal Service worker must begin to think “differently” from the personality occupying the identical space as “before”.  Like the mouth agape with wonder and the eyes of disbelief, the parameters of transfixed minds must change in order for change itself to occur.

Focus not upon the personality in history, but the object which remains constant throughout.  For, the cauldron which bears the aroma of a witch’s brew is not the same as the hand which stirs the pot; though, the ingredients of mystery and secrets unrevealed are lost in the historicity of timeless knowledge, and that is why the thought-process resulting from the witch’s brew is often as important as the personality who gathered the aura of potency lost in the steaming mixture of life’s hidden darkness.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Federal Disability Retirement Benefits: The Soliloquy

For the stage actor, it is the consummate moment of the trade — the opportunity to reveal the depth of character before an audience whose attention is monolithically focused upon the singular pinnacle of highlighted speech.

Shakespeare’s monologues of anguish and despair, of the most private of thoughts spoken through an accepted device of artistic asides which allows for the viewing public to listen in on reasonings otherwise hidden but for conversations with others or the ravings and rantings of the fool who sputters.  Yet, how reflective of true life such moments are, of the soliloquy which we engage but in the quietude of unspoken words.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer in silence because of the medical condition which is revealed, or hidden but painfully debilitating for fear of supervisors, managers or coworkers suspected of unwarranted viciousness of behavior, the unspoken thoughts and processes of rational discourse within should ultimately be bounced as against expertise and guidance for one’s future.

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, is indeed a lonely endeavor and reaches into multiple issues which are the most private and intimate of details — one’s medical condition; the impact of the medical condition upon the Federal or Postal employee’s personal and professional life; and, as well, the fears, hopes and concerns emanating from the loss of career, income and financial stability.

Having a medical condition such that the medical condition impacts the Federal or Postal employee’s ability to perform the essential elements of the Federal or Postal position, possesses indications of a spectrum between calm acceptance and calamity of livelihood.

That being said, the pragmatic steps to be taken must be fully considered, and preparing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application through OPM is one path upon which to seek advice and wise counsel.  For, remember that the artistic device in a soliloquy requires that the hearing audience remain silent, and not reach out to the performer on stage to interrupt, disagree or engage; yet, in hearing the actor reveal the most private of inner thoughts, it is precisely the failure of considering other options never offered or heard, which results in the disastrous outcome of the proportion constituting a Shakespearean tragedy.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

FERS & CSRS Disability Retirement: The Hangman’s Knot

The perfect knot is the most effective, and development of its features occurred over time through a science of art and an artistic employment of science.  The placement of the knot behind which ear; the number of coils before they became an impediment; and the avoidance, at all costs, of trespassing upon superstitious beliefs and potentially supernatural reverberations — these were all taken into account in perfecting the science of the art.

Its corollary, the art of the science, disregarded the efficacy of the knot; it was only the former which concerned itself with an objective evaluation of the results after each occurrence.  Like parachuters who pack and fold their own devices with a systematic routine of sprinkled superstitions, the hangman would often approach his craft with a religiosity and fervency of monotony such that any detour from the iconoclasm of repetition could delay or abandon the anointed time of impending doom.

In modernity, of course, any discussion concerning the hangman’s noose turned into a historicity of adages and proverbial wisdom; we construct our own knots, like the beds we make in which we must sleep, and the messes we create which we direct our children to clean up.

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 the Federal or Postal positional duties, the issue of when to file, how to file, the whys and whereabouts must always be taken into account; and like the hangman’s noose which is coiled slowly and deliberately, the Federal or Postal worker who prepares for the inevitably end must take care in the preparation and application for submission and filing.

It is, in the end, only the superficial features of the world which change; the essence of everything substantive remains constant, and that is precisely the point of Plato, Aristotle and the entire linear heritage of Western Philosophy — that the underlying meaningfulness of the world around us is that which is captured in truth.  And, like the hangman’s knot, what we do in preparing for the event of a lifetime is just as important as the incident itself, and that is why preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management is essential to securing a future of stability and security, where the process is just as crucial as the substance underlying.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire