Federal Medical Retirement under FERS: Vicious Circularity

There is a direct correlation between the growing mental health crisis and the increasingly focused reliance upon cognitive insularity — where engagement with “the world” is not between the subjective (our own thoughts, senses, moods, etc.) and the objective (the world “out there” in what Kant deemed unknowable, as encountered in the noumenal — not the phenomenal — universe), but rather, between the subjective and the perceptual apparatus of the meta-universe.

Whether at work or play, everyone, everywhere, at most times, is engaged on the computer, Smart Phone, etc.  A growing consensus says that a healthy mind requires engagement with the objective world for some period of time each day — of taking a walk and leaving your Smart Phone behind; of making some connection beyond the vicious circularity of your own thoughts within the meta-universe of a virtual reality.

The corporate giants clearly have a monetary self-interest in having the world become insular; for, the greater use of the electronic devices results in greater profits and increased dependency.  No one asked the common man whether we wanted a world made up of this vicious circularity, but here we are.

With the growing mental health crisis, more Federal and Postal workers need to consider filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits under FERS.  Fortunately, the MSPB and the Federal Courts of Appeals have recognized that there is no stigma to be placed on psychiatric medical disabilities.

Psychiatric conditions are just as valid a basis in filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits under the FERS benefits system, through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, as physical, non-psychiatric conditions.

As for the vicious circularity magnifying our mental health crisis?  That is for Psychiatrists and Therapists to deal with; but in the meantime, take their simple advice: Leave the Smart Phone and the Computer behind, and take your dog out for a walk.

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 Help: The Next Move

What thoughts are connoted from such a phrase?  For most, it is perhaps the penultimate game of the Western world — Chess.  Or, if you have been exposed to Eastern or Oriental influences, the game of Go.  Perhaps neither — and the phrase, “the next move”, may evoke thoughts of a basketball player or some other sport which requires a “next move”.

Back to chess — for, as it is played by slow and deliberate increments of moving pieces on a board, there is always a “next move”, until there is not.  As well, in the game of Go, white and black pieces are set upon a board, each player attempting to make a double-“eye” in order to secure their vulnerabilities, until there is no more room to protect.  Often, our lives are reflected in the metaphor of such board games, whether of chess or of Go.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition such that filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits becomes a necessary next move, you may want to contact a lawyer who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law.

Whether the next move is an initial application, or a response which must be filed with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management for a Denial of your Application for Federal Disability Retirement; or, from a second “Reconsideration Denial” resulting in a need to file an appeal to the U.S. Merit Systems Protection Board — contact an experienced attorney who is knowledgeable about the next move which must be taken.

For, whether in chess or a game of Go, or in filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits, it is always important to make sure that the “next move” is the one which will advance your cause with a winning strategy.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill
Lawyer exclusively representing Federal and Postal employees to secure their Federal Disability Retirement benefits under FERS from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.

 

Postal & Federal Disability Retirement under FERS: Change of Circumstances

The quantitative and qualitative changes; to what extent and degree; the consequences of the alteration; the impact; the need for adjustments or “accommodations”; these, and many more, determine the response required following a “change of circumstances”.

Death of a spouse; illness of a child or close relative; loss of income; increase of death — these, and many more, constitute a significant and substantive change of circumstances in one’s life.  Being outsourced, outmoded or deemed as obsolete; of being replaceable, fungible or no longer needed; in these technologically challenging times, we are all subject to the whims of a society focused upon productivity and not on human value.

A medical condition is considered a major change of circumstances, and can lead to the negative result of obsolescence.

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 change of circumstances necessitates triggering of an effective filing for FERS Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.

The medical condition itself is the “change”; the circumstances are comprised of the nexus between the medical condition and the impact upon one’s inability to perform all of the essential elements of one’s job; and it is this combination of “change” and “circumstance” which should prompt the Federal or Postal worker to contact an OPM Disability Attorney who specializes in FERS Disability Retirement Law.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire
Postal & Federal Employee Disability Lawyer

Disability Retirement for Federal Government Employees: Implications

Merely putting a ‘thus’ or ‘therefore’ does not create the necessary nexus between the facts proffered, the evidence presented and the conclusion declared; implications by definition require some work on the part of the audience, as the bridge not explicitly apparent must by necessity mandate mental connections to be drawn from otherwise disparate fields of facts.

How far can the law be stretched?  For so-called “originalists”, it is allegedly only the plain meaning of the text itself that can be gleaned, without any further “interpretation” beyond what is “originally intended”.  But lawyers go beyond the central meaning of legal opinions all the time; it is the job of a good attorney to stretch the application beyond what is originally meant or intended; and it is up to the next judge before whom such argumentation is tested to place limits and boundaries when the proposed stretch has gone a bridge too far.

How far, for example, can the “Bruner Argument” be made in a Federal Disability Retirement case?  Can the fact of a separation based upon “excessive absences” be used to demand of OPM that the Bruner Presumption should be applied, especially when parallel facts clearly establish that during the same time period of taking exhaustive Sick Leave and excessive LWOP, the Federal or Postal employee had multiple doctor’s appointments and was medically advised not to go to work?  Of course, arguments can always be made — but the real point is, Can one make an effective and persuasive argument?

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who are preparing a Federal Disability Retirement application, whether under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, those conclusions by implication need to be carefully crafted.  For, while you may see the bridges connecting the two or more land masses that are otherwise separated by the rivers and tributaries, it is up to the Federal employee applicant in an OPM Disability Retirement case to make explicit and obvious those implications that may otherwise be lost in the administrative morass of complexities inherent in every Federal Medical Disability Retirement case.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire
FERS Medical Disability Lawyer

 

Federal Disability Retirement under FERS & CSRS: Life erasing

In youth and early adulthood, we add; in later years, life erases.  Kids grow up and move elsewhere; vigor depletes; living spaces are downsized; mementoes once meaningful are discarded into a trash heap of forgotten memories; and health deteriorates, with diminution of lives by incremental depreciation both in appearance, worth and human value.

Life erasing is the natural decomposition of matter; the energy that we expended in bringing up our kids has now been complete, and transference of that vigor has become a permanent fixture.

Somehow, what we gave never seems to be enough, and no matter how much we tried, loved, cared for and nurtured, that part of all has separated and journeyed away, never to be sought in unenlightened venues of thoughtless abandonment.  It is as if life reaches its pinnacle, as the arc of never-ending geometric feats of engineering and technological defiance; and then it tapers, becomes warped and disappears into the far horizon.  What ever happened to those youthful dreams once embraced, promised, forever committed to, and now a dash of trailing dust left behind like so many of life’s erasing features?

Medical conditions and deteriorating health tends to symbolize that; for, as one reaches the pinnacle of an incomplete life (is it every complete, even at the point of oblivion, and do we not hang on for a moment more?), the tawdry reality is that we fear the vanishing of all that we have surrounded ourselves with, because we do not walk about this world with a mirror to appease our own insecurities.

Isn’t that why people amass great wealth; invoke power-plays to demand and command loyalty; hoard possessions as if they reflected quantifiable worth; and apply every cosmetic trick into believing that appearance of youth is the same as easing life’s erasing by concealing the decay beneath?  Why is it that such a natural deterioration is fought against, when the peaceful calm of wisdom tells us that life erasing is the easing of burdens amassed in youth and adulthood, and thus to be enjoyed?

Life erasing means that responsibilities garnered previously have now been alleviated, but instead of accepting that natural digression, we buy into the advertising colonnade that age is merely of deceptive appearances and a “mind set” that can be averted merely by acting more foolishly, accepting cosmetic alterations by stretching the wrinkles away, and taking on greater obligations for self-aggrandizement.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who are beset with medical conditions which prevent the Federal or Postal employee from extending a career chosen, whether the Federal employee or U.S. Postal worker is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, filing for Federal Disability Retirement is actually an acceptance of the natural course of life erasing – by the proverbial course of “downsizing”, of recognizing the medical conditions impacting one’s life and pursuing Federal Disability Retirement so that life’s erasing can attain a level of focus upon a priority long ignored:  Health.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Federal Employee Disability Retirement: The divided relic

If an ancient relic of sacred origins must always travel with wherever a community, a tribe or an individual must go, can its essence remain intact despite being divided into multiple forms?  Can a divided populace split into two its sacredly-held relic, whether for theological reasons of disputatious incommensurability, or simply resulting from an old-fashioned “I don’t like them anymore” conflict that has erupted into an irreconcilable fissure?  In other words, is the sacredness of the relic contained in the essence of the thing itself, or by the bonding influence of the people who view that item of antiquity with awe and frightful respect?

Whether a sacred scroll or a Bible (which, obviously, would be difficult to divide), or a crystalline object, an ancient arrow holding magical powers or an assortment of divinations empowered by a rich history of spiritual conquests — whether such relics can retain their efficacy for a community divided, might depend upon the strength of the belief itself, and the foundational reliance upon such antiquities of thought-processes.

That is, perhaps, one of the many problems of modernity; we no longer have the capacity to believe in the power of ancient relics, divided or not; and, instead, we put our faith into the predetermination of a Darwinian paradigm, where the gene pools of those who have survived merely contribute to the greater sense of invincibility within a genetically maladjusted populace of pure materialism.  Thus do we abandon all sacred rites of passage and living – of entrance into adulthood, marriage, the sacrament of forgiveness and the commodity of grace.

The divided relic does not lose its powers because of the division into pieces greedily and hastily fractured by human conflict, but because the very act itself merely reflects a broken heart no longer tethered by faith, belief, community or commonality of belonging.  No – it is because we have accepted fractured lives as a justification for dividing sacred relics, that the very sanctity of the relic itself has been diminished and sullied.

Indeed, that is what happens in the Federal sector and the U.S. Postal Service, with people and the workplace itself.  No, there are no sacred relics to be divided in the Federal agency or the U.S. Postal Service, but there can be – should be – a sense of commonality of purpose and an empathy undivided such that the work and missions of the entity itself can be carried forth with a purposeful intent.  The strength of that sense of cohesion, however, is often reflected when a Federal or Postal employee is beset with a medical condition, and must file a Federal Disability Retirement application through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset.

If the Federal agency or the U.S. Postal facility responds with supportive empathy (rarely seen), then that sense of an undivided and worthy relic remains like a residue of bright hope; but, more often than not, it is the opposite effect that is seen – of a divided relic reflected in the pool of harshness and indifference revealed by human depravity, by harassment, intimidation and scorn within the community of Federal and Postal workers.

Such a state of affairs when responding to a Federal or Postal worker who is in the process of going through the administrative trials of filing a Federal Disability Retirement application through OPM is reflective of this state of modernity, where the divided relic can so heartlessly be accomplished without concern for the essence of one’s soul.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Medical Retirement for Federal Employees: Trepidation

In this universe where pause reflects cautionary exposure, the Darwinian model of survival of the fittest prevails.  Ours is a society that lacks any patience; the youthful generation deems their “place” as a rightful commodity to assert without bashfulness; the old are shoved aside into old folks’ homes and nursing facilities, all the while as we give lip-service to the importance of love, family and care for one another.

It is easy to give utterances of inane and meaningless trope, of generalizations about values and moral circumlocutions of apparent profundities; much harder is to sacrifice what we want, desire or otherwise deem the encampments for our “personal bests”.  “Rights” asserted in your face constitute the norm of this generation; conformity to the quietude of societal conventions, of cohesions above dismembered cacophonies of ingratitude, are mere fodder to be cast aside.

Trepidation is a personality defect; as in the days of yore when tremulous fear, alarm or agitation constituted a pause which threatened the capacity to survive, so in modernity there is no room for such diminution of evocative negation.

Perhaps, in some other corner of the world, in a society which still values the careful fostering of human relationships, a person’s pause and trepidation to immediate action would be overlooked and unnoticed, if not merely because the significance of such hesitation would be considered nothing more than a throw-away phrase, somewhat like, “Oh, you know Betsy, she always has to have a few days before she does something!”  But we don’t have “a few days” in this corner of civilization, where daily predatory advancement is the means to success, and why disabled people are merely used as referential legal maneuvers, but otherwise shoved aside into dark corners where alleged accommodations are granted within the strictures of malleable definitions.  No, it was never curiosity that killed the cat; it was always trepidation of cautionary hesitancy.

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 notion that the Federal or Postal employee may have some initial feelings of trepidation before engaging the process, is both understandable as well as self-defeating.

The reality is, we have to engage the world we live in.  And the world we occupy is this little corner of the globe, where patience is lacking, hesitancy is scoffed at, and delay is deemed a purposeless abyss of wasted time.  The bureaucratic morass itself will take a long, long time, just to receive a decision from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.  Trepidation is not a personality trait which is healthy for the process, and unfortunately, it is a counterintuitive characteristic that only serves to exacerbate the medical condition itself.

Sincerely, Robert R. McGill, Esquire

FERS & CSRS Federal Employee Disability Retirement Benefits: Examples

What if we never grew up with any?  Is it not by metaphor and analogy that we all escape the citadel of ivory towers and the dangers of glass barriers and unseen traumas?  They tell us that the early years of “imprint” are crucial for stability, development and self-discipline against asocial behaviors; yet, even after the crucial years following the correlation subsequent to the first encounter with the world, and just before the turmoil of puberty and into adulthood, there are indicators that failure of examples to take hold can still be corrected in order to prevent the ghastly concretization of personality misfits, where pathological deviancy may yet be avoided.

Are examples important?  Like paradigms upon which theories are tested, and foundations that gird the architectural integrity of a high rise, they provide the basis and essence of a personality otherwise left to miscreants of changing winds and altering tides.  Tectonic shifts in the undersea of the human soul can bring out the tidal waves of cruelty and conduct unbecoming; parents hope that the midnight call from the sheriff’s office is not a reflection of any apparent failure, or the alluring eyes of guilt and condemnation when asked how the toddler learned it, and the babbling mouth which emits the torrent of shivering fright:  “My parents taught me.”

Yet, negation and trepidation of containment just so that one’s own reputation will not be sullied, are often wanting.  To “not” engage in examples of bad exemplars is merely a negation of purpose, and fails to address the positive requirement of that which an example entails.  For, negation of a positive mandate merely leaves one with a nothingness in a world of meaning where there is a plenitude of bad examples.  Not providing the positive input will merely allow for innocence to be tattered and jostled; for, where there is a vacuum, the desire to fill and load will come from influences unwanted and unwelcomed.

In a society where there is no mechanism for generational transfer of wisdom, the young are at the mercy of the whims of those who lurk in corners of bestiality and congregations of cultish canopies; there is no such thing as innocence, anymore – just stupidity clothed as symbols to be desecrated.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who are filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management “for the first time”  — how often is there a subsequent event?  — Such an act of preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits is always Act I, Scene I of the end of one’s Federal or Postal career.  As it occurs in the first introduction to one’s life-play, there are no “examples” to follow; except, perhaps, to consult with an attorney who is experienced in matters of Federal Disability Retirement law.

As such, where there is failure of a newborn’s imprint, and no paradigms of prodigies to follow, the effective preparation in a Federal Disability Retirement application, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS of CSRS Offset, may well be in seeking the advice and counsel of an example set by a person who has previously avoided the pitfalls and obstacles of such a complex administrative and bureaucratic endeavor.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire