Federal and Postal Disability Retirement: The Bailiwick of Time

Time tends to incrementally, insidiously, and imperceptibly creep up and, with a sudden shudder of fright, present itself in a crisis of thought. Whether we control it; to what extent we are slaves to it; all that we can do is manage it, and to recognize that the bailiwick of time begins within our own minds, extends to the world around us, and ends when nightfall and the slumber of silence overtakes the heavy-laden eyelids to lead us back into the abyss and recesses of our own minds.

Waiting fails to extend the objective existence of time; procrastination merely kicks the proverbial can down the pathway where all things accumulate and aggregate, until time runs out and a crisis ensues. When a statute governs a legal or administrative process, that circle of authority must be followed, unless one is prepared to try and argue a narrow exception which may or may not allow for the extension of a deadline. That is indeed a strange concept of foreboding: time tied to a “deadline”; it evokes images of cessation, termination, and end to survivability.

For Federal and Postal Workers who suffer from a medical condition, such that the medical condition prevents one from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal job, the bailiwick of time begins to run; not only with respect to the necessity of filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management but, more importantly, if the Federal or Postal Worker is separated from service, that Federal or Postal Worker has only one (1) year from the time of separation to file for Federal Disability Retirement benefits.

If that one-year Statute of Limitations is not met or complied with, you lose your right forever to file for the benefit. In days of yore, if a wrong was committed or violated, the bailiff was sent out to enforce the law; for the Federal or Postal employee who procrastinates, it is the bailiwick of time which will come in the stealth of night, and impose itself before one is even aware of the steady march of life’s linear and inevitable watch, and confine the violator to the law of limitations.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

Medical Retirement for Disabled Federal Workers: Transfinite Cardinals

It is a concept invented in order to avoid the inherently problematic implications of the “infinite”; yet, it clearly means that it is “not finite”. It is meant to avoid a type of exclusive disjunctive and attempts to equivocate and obfuscate, implying that it somehow goes beyond the finite but refuses to become embroiled in the complexities of the infinite, thereby allowing for a compromise by remaining forever in the limbo of mathematical purgatory.

Such conceptual word-games save us for a time; and, sometimes, time is what is needed. Thus, for universes of pure theoretical constructs, where application has little or no impact upon the reality of life, conceptual language games can be daily engaged and walked away from, without any practical consequences. It is, however, when theory intersects with reality, that qualitative reverberations become felt, as in the application of theoretical physics upon the pragmatic application of nuclear fusion.

Advancing from Thought to Action

For the everyday Federal and Postal Worker, the theoretical existence of Federal Disability Retirement benefits, whether one is under FERS or CSRS, is likened to transfinite cardinals: until the intersection between thought and action occurs, it remains safely in the universe of theory, mind, and limbo; but when the reality of a medical condition hits upon the physical universe of the real, and impacts the Federal or Postal employee’s ability/inability to maneuver through the employment sector because of physical limitations or psychiatric obstacles imposed by the medical condition, then one must reach beyond the theoretical and take pragmatic steps of prudent applicability.

Like boilerplate legalese in multi-paginated contractual agreements, theoretical constructs exist for potential applications in the real universe.

Federal Disability Retirement benefits remain in existence for all Federal and Postal employees, and must be accessed by submitting an application to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management. It is like the Platonic Ideas of Greek philosophy “out there” in the ethereal universe, but of no consequence but for ivory tower constituents. And like transfinite cardinals, Federal Employee Disability Retirement benefits remain in a parallel universe of theoretical constructs, until that time when a particular Federal or Postal employee accesses the need to ignite the fuse of pragmatic intentions.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

 

OPM FERS/CSRS Disability Retirement: The Time is Now

Waiting for the perfect storm is always the most persuasive grounds for procrastination; that time where coalescence of all necessary factors come together to provide the optimal moment to do something, but which never arrives; and so there is always one issue still to point to, where one can say, “X has not occurred, yet,” in order to delay the inevitable.

The problem with allowing for perfection to prevent action, is that in the meantime it allows for the deterioration of surrounding circumstances and conditions to occur, thereby further exacerbating the allowance for any such perfection to appear.  Grounds always exist to excuse an action; and when the seriousness of contemplating a change of vocation or stoppage of a career is at stake, such grounds are normally reasonable and real.  But at some point, especially when contemplating filing for Federal Disability Retirement from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether under FERS or CSRS, the Federal or Postal employee must simply acknowledge the fact that one’s present circumstance itself is less-than-a-perfect situation, and with that admission, to weigh the factors in deciding whether filing for FERS or CSRS Disability Retirement is the only viable option left.

In a fantasy-filled virtual world, it may well be that one can wait for the coming-together of perfect circumstances; in the “real” world, one must face and decide upon options which may not always present themselves as the best of all possible worlds.

The problem with today is that many of us live in the virtual world of videos; but there is a Kantian world of objectivity out there, and the coldness of that world is often reflected in the very agencies for which Federal and Postal Workers work.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

Federal Disability Retirement: From Language to Pragmatic, Substantive & Sequential Steps

The leap from words-to-actions constitutes a milestone of advancement; otherwise, if left in the world of Wittgensteinian language games, where all one does is talk incessantly without “doing” anything, then one merely remains in a universe of one’s own creation.

We all know people “like that” — of talking, talking big, and talking non-stop; and as the talk continues, the world leaves such people behind.  Dreams are paradigms for the wide-eyed youth to search, attempt to strive towards, and to have the incentive to “reach for the stars”; but the reality of the world must also become a stark admixture in order for dreams to be interpreted into actuality.

The young basketball player who dreams of stardom in the NBA cannot reach such a goal unless he practices daily, relentlessly, and at the expense of many leisure and other activities.  It is ultimately the pragmatic steps which must be taken, which represent progress of sorts from a logical, sequential standpoint:  From A to B.

In preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, the undersigned attorney is often confronted with:  “I requested the forms from my agency, but I have no idea how to fill them out.”  Forms simplify processes, but they, too, are a composite of a jumble of words — on paper, in written form [sic].

Beyond mere words, in order to obtain Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, one must have a tactical and strategic plan — of how to meet the legal test of “preponderance of the evidence“; of how to gather and obtain the proper medical documentation; and how to create the “nexus” between one’s medical condition and the positional duties which one occupies and from which one will be filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.

The world of language is one of beauty, but of an artifice of creation in man’s universe; it is the way of pragmatism which must be embraced, in order to be successful in preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

Disability Retirement for Federal Workers: The Anxiety of Procrastination

In preparing, formulating and filing a Federal Disability Retirement application under FERS or CSRS, there are numerous issues, points, time-frames,etc., during the administrative process, when a Federal or Postal employee’s anxieties may become exacerbated — both because of the inherent complications resulting from the process itself, as well as because of what others do.  Many of the complexities which arise are beyond the control of one’s capabilities.  Thus, if one is accustomed to having some “control” over events and circumstances, it can quickly become a process full of anxieties, exasperation and frustration.  

Time is often beyond one’s control — the time the Agency takes to fill out their portion; the time a doctor responds to a request for a medical narrative; and, finally, the time that the Office of Personnel Management takes in reviewing and rendering a decision on a Federal Disability Retirement application.  

One point of frustration which often builds without ceasing, however, is within the control and capacity of all Federal Disability Retirement applicants — procrastination.  Procrastination merely delays the inevitable, and compounds the complexities because it merely allows for outside difficulties and problems to continue to build, without resolution.  If the need arises to begin filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits under FERS or CSRS, procrastination should not be part of the game plan.  This is especially true because the Office of Personnel Management is a bureaucracy which takes a long time itself, and procrastinating at the front-end of the process will only delay things further at the back-end.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

OPM Disability Retirement: The Time to Make the Decision (Part 2)

The medical condition known as “Fibromyalgia” is analogous to the manner in which Federal and Postal employees approach the decision-making process in filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits under FERS & CSRS.  Let me explain:  Fibromyalgia, as the Office of Personnel Management often likes to characterize, often manifests itself with chronic and diffuse pain which “waxes and wanes” — meaning, in simple terms, that there are good days and bad days; days when the pain is unbearable, excruciating and debilitating; and days when one can “manage” the extent of the pain and mental dysfunction and confusion. With that context, the Office of Personnel Management often tries to argue that it is not “so bad” as to qualify for Federal Disability Retirement benefits under FERS & CSRS. 

By analogy, people with all sorts of medical conditions — from physically debilitating neck and back pain; from Orthopaedic injuries, arthritis, chronic pain, visual impairment, etc.; to psychiatric disabilities of Major Depression, anxiety, panic attacks, PTSD — some days, one can seem to manage the disability; on other days, one cannot get through the day, let alone perform the essential elements of one’s job.  But deep down, one knows that one cannot continue forever on the same course.  To continue is to slowly wither away by a thousand cuts, one cut at a time, one cut per day.  And so, just as the Office of Personnel Management is plainly wrong (for Fibromyalgia is a chronic and debilitating medical condition which clearly qualifies for disability retirement), so the person who procrastinates in making the decision to file for Federal Disability Retirement benefits under FERS & CSRS is simply waiting for the inevitable.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire