Loss of stature and status can come in many forms; we think too often in terms of financial status, of material belongings, where we live, with whom we associate, and the subtle evaluation of social consciousness in relation to our neighbors, friends and family. But as work constitutes a majority of the time we expend, we often fail to understand the profound impact that we subconsciously place upon the status and standing we perceive within the employment arena. This is closely related to the conceptual viability of bifurcating our “time at work” and “closing the door behind us” when we exit our place of employment, get into the car, and begin the commute home.
More and more, of course, the traditional dichotomy between work and personal life has been destroyed with the intrusive nature of email, smart phones, laptops and the constant need to keep in communication via electronic media. The sanctity of the home life is deteriorating; weekends are merely interludes of a slower pace of work; and Sundays are rarely categorized as days of unreachable separateness.
With all traditional social and employment walls disintegrated, it becomes all the more profoundly insidious when one’s employment is severely impacted by a medical condition.
For Federal and Postal employees who must consider filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. office of Personnel Management, whether under FERS or CSRS, the change from the status of “Federal employee” or “Postal Worker” to one of “Disability annuitant” can have a devastating psychological impact. For, in the end, it is not merely a change of status and stature; it is a profound alteration of a way of life, arrived at through habituation without thought, mindlessly embracing the insidiousness of technological intrusions which we never asked for and rarely sought.
The negative view for the Federal and Postal Worker is to myopically observe this profound change in sadness; the positive outlook is to have a fresh perspective, and to actually take the opportunity to use the time for rehabilitation of one’s health, perhaps just to be able to — for a brief moment in the history of one’s life — stop and smell the proverbial flower on the way out of the office door.
Sincerely,
Robert R. McGill, Esquire
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Federal & Postal Service Disability Retirement: Personal v. Objective
Filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits is a personal matter. It is personal precisely because it is considered as an admission of a disability; it goes to the heart of what a person does in life — one’s livelihood, one’s means of support; and it goes to the perception in our society of the “worth” of an individual — financial worth, productive worth, worth in terms of the ability to support a family, and worth in terms of one’s contribution to society. Because it is so personal, it is difficult to “objectively” assess and evaluate a disability retirement claim, by the individual who is thinking about filing for such a benefit.
That is often why it is important to have an attorney represent an individual who is considering filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits. Often, when I am hired at the second or third Stage of the process, I read the initial submissions of the client, and find that the “personal” has indeed overtaken the “objective”, precisely because the very subject of the disability retirement process — the applicant — had to undertake the very personal process himself/herself. Such personal subjectivity cannot see beyond the very personal nature of the medical condition, and when that happens, it is almost too personal for the OPM representative to make an objective assessment of the case.
Sincerely,
Robert R. McGill, Esquire
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