OPM Disability Retirement under FERS: The Long Slog

Whether impatience is a uniquely American characteristic (a flawed one?) or is merely something inherently inseparable from the human species generally is a debate for anthropologists and similar academic theoreticians to engage; but in any event, it does appear to pervade the American character in pervasive plenitude.

We are impatient about almost everything — and appear to be willing to abandon all “old ways” in favor of the “new”.  This leads to some disastrous results — as in our impatience for conflicts that last too long and our quick willingness to abandon our efforts because our goals were neither quickly nor easily achieved.

The Long Slog is always problematic for the impatient — for, it means that we must commit time and resources for periods beyond a murky, endless timeframe.  How long something takes cannot always be clearly quantified, and often the anticipated length must be ignored and, instead, achievement must be measured not in terms of time, but in light of merely remaining and showing a steadfast commitment to honoring a timeless commitment.

This is often difficult because other thoughts begin to intrude during the endless lull — Are we wasting our time?  What if we are throwing away good money after bad (a very common thought);  What if we never achieve our goal?  And many more such concerns, besides.  How do we counter the natural concerns of the Long Slog?

First, by clarifying at the outset one’s commitment to a process, and recognizing that the stated goal can only be achieved without regard to time, and Secondly, to accept that any timeframe anticipated should be multiplied by a factor of 10.

Commitment is a difficult value to uphold, and that is why a marriage covenant is so often broken — for, who can even conceive of honoring a promise “Till death do us part” without knowing the particulars of what a lifetime will entail?  All that goes into a “lifetime” — of joys and sorrows, of happiness, suddenly overshadowed by sickness and tragedies unforeseen — in short, the normal history of all of mankind.

Thus do so many people end in divorce and, similarly do long-term commitments become abandoned and forgotten human detritus.

Likewise, when a Federal or a Postal employee decides to engage in the process of preparing, formulating, and filing a Federal Disability Retirement under FERS through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM), one must mentally prepare for the Long Slog.  It is a long and arduous, complicated bureaucratic process involving potentially 3 stages, and with an “almost certainty” of an initial denial from OPM no matter how well-crafted and fully documented the initial filing is composed.

Contact a FERS Disability Lawyer who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law, and begin to prepare for The Long Slog.

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 Benefits: But OPM Does

In preparing and submitting a FERS Medical Retirement application with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, you may think that certain “minor details” will be overlooked, and that your application will “fly through” without a hitch.  Maybe you are not a “detail-oriented” person, or you think that it doesn’t matter if certain “inconsistencies” are evident in your filing.  Or, maybe you just don’t care because your focus is upon getting through the day.

But OPM does.  The U.S. Office of Personnel Management is looking for every excuse to deny your Federal Disability Retirement application.

To some extent, that is their job, of course.  Every Federal Disability Retirement application which comes before the U.S. Office of Personnel Management is scrutinized, where all “boxes” for eligibility must be “checked”.  And while you — the applicant — may not think that certain administrative requirements are all that important, OPM does.

OPM will deny your Federal Disability Retirement claim in a proverbial “heartbeat”.

To increase the chances of success, contact a Federal Disability Retirement Lawyer and make sure that any inherent inconsistencies in your Federal Disability Retirement application are avoided.  For, while you may not see such inconsistencies as being relevant or important, “But OPM does” is the important point, here, and moreover, your Federal Disability Retirement Lawyer will certainly be able to distinguish the difference between important inconsistencies and those which are not.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Medical Retirement for Federal Employees: The real me

Are there societies in which the non-existence of the concept of “self” reveals a qualitative difference in approaching life in general?  Does the fact that language embraces the singular personal pronoun in contradistinction to the plural, communal form (i.e., “we” or “us”) make a difference in the manner in which we see the world?

If “I” as the subject/nominative form or the “me” as the objective (accusative and dative form) were to be expunged from the English Lexicon, would the universe be shaken and the axis upon which rotation occurs be shattered such that earth would no longer remain as we have known it?  Or — beyond the modernity of linguistic philosophy, where there are no substantive philosophical problems which cannot be solved by Wittgensteinian means of clarifying, modifying or overhauling the language game utilized — will we merely go on as before and act “as if” the “I” and “me” did not exist, but carry on for selfish purposes, anyway?

There is always that hankering by each one of us that “if only…”.  If only people knew the “real me”; if only she could recognize the uniqueness of the “I” that doesn’t quite come out right because of my nervousness, shyness, etc.  If only the boss knew; if only my wife knew; if only my husband knew….

The cynic, of course, would counter with: Good thing no one knows the real you….  Or, is it really just another form of the philosophical conundrum that we have cornered ourselves into — sort of like Ryle’s “Ghost in the Machine” argument where Cartesian dualism doesn’t exist, and so there is no “real me” beneath the surface of what we present to the world — that, in fact, we really are boorish, one-dimensional and unsophisticated creatures who put on a good show, and that is all there is to the “I” and “me”: A composite of the Neanderthal who puts on a necktie and pronounces words and phrases in monosyllabic forms of grunts and groans?

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition and who must consider filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, the real “I” or “me” is certainly not the person whom the Agency has tagged as “less than whole” because of the medical condition itself.

Yet, that is how the Federal Agency and the Postal unit will often approach the unfortunate circumstances of the Federal employee or Postal worker who reveals an intent to file for OPM Disability Retirement benefits under FERS.  No longer as part of the “we” or “us” team of Federal employees or Postal workers, the Federal Disability Retirement applicant is often shunned and sequestered, and generally harassed and placed under administrative sanctions — merely for revealing a vulnerability resulting from a medical condition.

That is essentially where the problem of the “real me” resides: Of how we pigeonhole one another.

To avoid that as much as possible, it is a good idea to consult with an Attorney who Specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law, to fight back against the notion of the real me that the Federal Agency or the Postal Service wants to depict, as that malingering worker who once was X, but is now seen as Y.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Medical Retirement under FERS: In the end…

What is it about a phrase that predictably tells us about the mood, content or direction of the mindset?  If a person begins with, “Well, it all began when…” — we will often stifle a yawn, try to make excuses and begin heading for the exits.  Self-aggrandizing, prefatory remarks that set the stage for a narrative delineation that includes private details of individual lives often bore the pants off of most people, and yet many will “tell all”, as if such intimate details trigger a prurient interest within each of us.

Then, of course, there is the opposite, as in: “In the end…”.  What fills in the ellipses?  In the end…the world will all go to the trash bin of history’s footnotes; In the end…we all die, anyway?  Such opening phrases and closing remarks leave out the vast chasm of filling in “the middle”, of course.  How does a story begin, tell the narrative in an interesting manner in “the middle” and end with a bang?  That is the problem, isn’t it?  Most of us don’t have a clue as to how to tell an interesting tale.

And what about non-fiction — of a historical narrative or of a biography?  What makes for an interesting “telling” of it — of what details of a person’s life; what incidents should be included?  What peripheral, tangential details will make for an interesting and engaging read?  Is a biography incomplete if the author leaves out certain details, or does it matter?  What “events” are presumed and should therefore be excluded, and can it really be said that certain excluded moments are considered to be excluded at all?

For example, it is presumed that a person goes to the bathroom a few times a day, at least — but what if, during the narrative of a biography or a historical period, such activities are never mentioned?  Can we call up the author and demand to know why such historical “facts” were excluded from the biography of, say, an important figure?

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, it may be necessary to begin to formulate 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.

As part of that “administrative process”, it is necessary to complete SF 3112A, Applicant’s Statement of Disability.

In preparing the narrative story of one’s medical condition, it is important to convey the essential “story” — a historical account; a prefatory introduction; a “middle”; and an “In the end…”.

What details to include; the choice of words; whether in the first-person or 3rd-person narrative; of what legal arguments to include; whether to “exclude” certain details without being charged with “falsifying” a claim, etc. — these are all important considerations in the proper, complete and sufficient preparation, formulation and filing of an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, and it is vitally important to do it “the right way” when preparing SF 3112A — the core and essence of a FERS Disability Retirement claim — which, in the end, is the story of your tale that needs to be told.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

Medical Retirement from Civil Service: The topic of conversation

How does it come about – that “topic of conversation”?  Is it merely and completely randomly selected, and in a spurious manner caught like the quiet embers that ignite an out-of-control wildfire?  Or, does someone Google on the Internet, something like, “Good dinner conversation topics”, and then proceed to print them out so that silence does not pause the ebb and flow of a party’s chatter?

If you listen carefully at conversations (which, by the way, are becoming a rarity these days, as one becomes ensconced in one’s own insular world of smart phones and Facebook postings, Instagram obsessions and Twitter feeds of inane utterances), you realize the randomness of subjects embraced, and how they often travel like a drunken driver meandering without lights or signals to brace the passersby.  Is that how Darwinian evolution looks like as an analogy of sorts?  A senseless, meandering coveting of erupting utterances without guide, meaning, direction or purpose?

But what if you become the topic of conversation – does it suddenly change, where the ear is suddenly turned red, the interest enlivened, and the aura of disinterestedness suddenly lifts?  And what if you are not in the room, but left to freshen up or take a break, and upon your reentrance, the silence suddenly pauses and the topic of conversation reveals a fissure and a gravitational shift that suddenly embarrasses and shames?  The ears burn – is that merely an old wives’ tale, or does that really happen?

Isn’t that what occurs with Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who are considering filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management?

As an attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law, the undersigned is often asked as to when the agency or the Postal Facility should be informed, prior to submission of an OPM Disability Retirement application, of one’s intent to file. It is a rather complicated question, and can have consequences unforeseen and not always positively received, and thus should be specifically tailored to each individual circumstance.

But do not be fooled:  The Federal or Postal employee who files a Federal Disability Retirement application through OPM, at some point during the process will inevitably become the topic of conversation; whether that should bother you, or you should care, depends upon many factors, and not the least of which is often influenced by sound representation by a Federal Disability Retirement lawyer who has guided the Federal Disability Retirement process throughout the gambit of the administrative process.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

FERS & CSRS Disability Retirement: Trading places

Long before the 2008 debacle of economic turmoil; preceding epic movies following, of the lavish ineptitude of miscreants awash in money’s sale of souls in exchange for the temporal pleasures of limitless fantasies; when laughter could be heard yet, because the future still held some hope, there was a movie by the same title.  It was a comedy of innocence – although, the language used may still blush for some, it reveals a period long gone and no longer found in today’s society where revealing all, telling everyone and showing unabashedly have become the normative course of behavior.

Unlike the reality of Wall Street’s mechanism of manipulation, the storyline follows a fairly conventional discourse of moral constancy – of identifiable evil; revenge and retribution for wrongs committed; redemption for those whose failings resulted from unseemly characters.  Contrast that with the fictional depictions of today, some mere several decades hence:  the unjust are left unpunished, or barely so; the miscreants are bailed out from their own folly and greed; and the Mom & Pop store just around the corner is still left wondering why they were never rescued from bankruptcy, when the very ones who created the economic crisis are back at it, again.

The problem with discussing such issues on a macro-scale, of course, is that generalities invite sweeping statements of inane and excusable tendencies, whereas kitchen-table, microcosmic tales of individual narratives leave no room for such averted cover of hidden devices, where rats and other scoundrels may scurry to find convenient places to conceal their shameful misdeeds.

We often wish that we, too, could “trade places”, but only because we fail to listen to the details of troubles faded on lawns across the street where the grass appears greener, but where the internal turmoil of ghosts hidden remain veiled.

Medical conditions have a way of bringing us all back to the basics of living.  For, when one is healthy, all sorts and manner of wishing for fortunes and superficiality of life’s extras are engaged; but when a medical condition hits, all that we desire is for the boredom of good health.  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 the Federal or Postal employee’s position of formal occupation (as reflected on an SF 50 or PS Form 52), understand this concept all too well.

Trading places is all relative, especially when it comes to the basics of human happiness.  For Louis Winthorpe III and Billy Ray Valentine, it happened that fate brought two unlikely characters together to right the wrongs of a macroeconomic system left to manipulative devices on the commodities trading floor; for the Federal and Postal employee who suffers 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, the desire to “trade places” is somewhat more basic – of mere good health in order to maintain a constancy of life’s pleasures taken for granted by others.

But, instead, often the best option for trading places is to prepare, formulate and file an effective Federal Disability Retirement application, submitted to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset.  Sometimes, the trade itself is a compromise on a micro-scale of lesser proportions, and not within the complex world of high finance and commodities exchanges.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

OPM Federal Employee Disability Retirement: The Horizon of the “Other”

The horizon is that demarcation between earth and the heavens; in days of yore, it was the navigational calculus extracted from the curvature of the visible sea in determining distance, time, and the impending cliff over which the ship’s captain would fathom monsters of devouring delights.  It is where appearance emerges.

What is shown; what becomes visible to the naked eye; that which is unconcealed and revealed; what the “other” allows for, and manifests, is the horizon of personhood.  For some, the superficiality of one’s persona becomes evident quickly and early; others, boredom sets in after a few encounters; for a rare few, the horizon fails to unfold despite a lifetime of inquisitive hunting.

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 question often entangles the time to judge the other’s horizon, when to emerge from the curvature of anonymity; and the timing of dissemination of information to the agency or the U.S.Postal Service.

In Naval warfare of days gone, it was the ability to view through the powerful monocular from the vantage point of the crow’s nest, which gave the strategic advantage when first sight of the enemy’s position and direction appeared at the horizon.

The revelation of one’s medical condition is likely to already have been a subject of whispered discussions at the workplace; but actually declaring to the Federal agency, its managers and supervisors, of the intent to file for Federal Disability Retirement benefits, is nevertheless somewhat of a “cat-and-mouse” play, where the bifurcating moment of significance is somehow delineated in that very admission of submission.

Preparing and formulating an effective Federal Disability Retirement application under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset takes time and care; the filing of it, a timing to take care.  Whether and when to inform the Federal agency or the U.S. Postal Service; obviously the filing itself will inform them; but as to whether to declare to the horizon of the other before appearing at that dividing line where earth and the heavens meet, is something which should be done with sage advice and a view towards legal implications.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

OPM Disability Benefits: The Eyes Which Betray the Laughter

Plato noted the significance of the eyes; as windows of the soul, they reveal the depth of emotion, character, empathy, interest, boredom, meanness, etc.; and just as true, the lack thereof.  Laughter provides the concordance of mirth to context; cacophony occurs when the harmony between the two somehow fails to connect.

The pinnacle of sadness is represented when one looks upon an individual, hears the laughter, and sees the revelatory sadness deep within the eyes of the soul.  The discordant contrast takes us aback; it is perhaps the height of self-contradiction, where the parallel universes which are never supposed to transect, suddenly violate the very content of definition, and betray the consciousness of self-doubt.

What has transpired?  What tragedy has befallen?  It brings to mind the poignant story by Chekhov, entitled “Grief” (or otherwise translated as “Misery”), where the death of the son is magnified by the haunting question, “With whom shall I tell my grief?”  As the world he continues to encounter is filled with passengers who laugh and carry on with life, the father must continue within the disharmony of his own tragedy.

Medical conditions tend to do that to people; it remains silent, but for the sharing beyond the perfunctory response to the passing, “Hello, how are you?”  We are expected to say merely, “Fine, thank you,” and move on.  Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers know about the emotional disjunctive between the eyes and the emitting laughter.  When the sound of mirth and the sight of pain clash, it is probably time to make an exit by filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits.

While often not the “best solution”, it allows for the Federal or Postal worker to leave one’s employment, secure a disability annuity, and seek a restoration of one’s health, in order to reinvigorate the soul behind the eyes of tragedy.

Filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits, whether the Federal employee and U.S. Postal worker is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, is a long and arduous journey through a bureaucratic maze.  There is the process itself; the need to substantively put together and formulate an effective and persuasive disability retirement packet; and then the long wait before the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.

Every Federal and Postal employee must make the decision of when and how; but as to the “why” of the foundation, it is when the eyes begin to betray the laughter, that affirmative steps need to be taken to begin to prepare, formulate and file for Federal Disability Retirement benefits.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire
Federal Disability Retirement Lawyer