FERS Disability Retirement: The Acceleration Principle

In economics, the principle makes the logical connection between the demand for consumer goods and the requirement of accelerated production needs in order to meet the higher demand.  In other words, when the demand for consumer goods increases, it logically follows that the demand for equipment will accelerate because the means of production in order to meet the consumer demands will need to be fulfilled.

In a similar vein, there is a parallel principle in other sectors of life — educational acceleration of mediocrity, for example.  It would make sense that if a country’s educational system systematically reduces its standards of excellence, that as the years pass, everyone over time will be dumber because those students who go through the “system” and go on to become teachers, will teach the next generation of students at a reduced level of rigor, and the acceleration principle will come into play as each successive generation teaches the next at a dumbed-down level.

Similarly, wouldn’t this same principle be applicable in areas of reading, for example — where, a nation which reads less but expends a greater amount of time in watching videos, becoming entrenched in the virtual maze of computers and Smartphones, or in video games, etc., will accelerate into a population of illiteracy and cultural ineptitude?

How about in health — isn’t there a similar principle experienced, where being young can somewhat compensate for a chronic health condition, but where age or some traumatic event can trigger and accelerate the health condition where, heretofore, it had been somewhat managed and controlled?

The U.S. Office of Personnel Management, of course, will turn that on its head if you are not careful.  They will argue thus: You had a preexisting condition; there are no objective indicators that it worsened during your tenure as a Federal Employee.  Thus, your case is denied.  Contact a FERS Disability Lawyer who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law, and consider that the acceleration principle is both valid and effective, if delineated in the best and proper manner.

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: Maintenance and Repair

We know the difference; of performing regular maintenance as opposed to the necessity of repair when something breaks down.

In recent years, there has arisen a cottage industry for every type of mechanical device: Of heating units and cooling systems; of automobiles; of computers; snow blowers, etc.  Maintenance is the yearly or semi-annual need for attending to required cleaning, parts-replacement and other issues — in an effort to prevent a breakdown.

Repair is when the breakdown occurs, and when we can then blame either the failure of maintenance as the failed preventative measure (now, in reflection, thought to have been unnecessary), or the question as to why such maintenance failed to detect or otherwise forecast the failure.

Medicine itself has engaged in that line of thinking: By getting regular checkups, scheduled diagnostic tests, follow dietary guidelines, etc., we believe that such “maintenance” actions can prevent the onset of disease and conditions.

An analogy can be made for preparing, formulating and filing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application under FERS: Preventative maintenance is hiring a lawyer who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law; Repair is if you do a “do-it-yourself” approach for the Initial Stage of the Process, or even the Reconsideration Stage, then you go to a Federal Disability Lawyer to “repair” the denial from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.

In the end, while no lawyer can guarantee a successful outcome in a FERS Federal Disability Retirement application, the preventative maintenance of a Federal Disability Retirement application is the preferred course, but if you get denied, you will certainly need to get the legal repair-work done by contacting an attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Lawyer

 

Federal Employees Retirement System (FERS) Disability Benefits: Obstacles

There are many in life; whether of financial, physical, intellectual or emotional; whether we are born with certain God-given talents or lack them in excess of explicit ignorance; or whether we are born with that proverbial “silver spoon in our mouths” or not, the burden we carry is like John Bunyan’s heavy knapsack, of the sins we create and carry.

Some obstacles are objectively in existence and have no relationship to the ones we create; others, within ourselves and created by the ghosts of our past deeds.  To what extent are the obstacles which prevent us from advancing merely the emotional difficulties we bring about?

Certainly, this world is an “unfair” one — one in which who one is born to, where one is a citizen of, and to which “class” we belong to plays a large role in who we can become; and in the end, sheer will and determination to succeed may not be enough.  The 5’ 10” young man who is born with spindly legs and lack of coordination will likely never become a professional basketball player no matter how hard he tries; and the individual who lacks a foundation of talent in any given area certainly faces obstacles beyond the reach of dreams or hopes; but is that the definition of “fairness” or “unfairness”?

Early on, it is important to assess one’s circumstances, talents and opportunities, and tailor our goals accordingly.  Should you “shoot for the stars”, nevertheless?  Possibly — but still, with an objective assessment.

How about when you engage in a process like filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits?  Should you make a similar assessment about the obstacles to be faced?  As in life generally, so should the same rules apply before entering the complex arena of Federal Disability Retirement Law.

As trying to obtain a Federal Disability Retirement annuity presents multiple obstacles, so should the Federal or Postal employee contemplating filing for the benefit of Federal Disability Retirement reach out to a FERS Disability Retirement Attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law and consider the options, the difficulties — the obstacles — before pursuing such a benefit.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

FERS Disability Retirement Benefits: Dimensions

We refer to the 3-dimensional world as being comprised of length, width and depth (where “length” can also be substituted for “height”, and “breadth” for “width”), with the added abstraction of time included in relativistic physics; and of course, when referring to personalities and individuals, we caustically apply the limitations of a dimension based upon the lack of character or absent crucial social graces, like empathy or a myopic viewing of life.

Thus does “John” live a one-dimensional life because all he ever does is work; or perhaps “Mary” is a one-dimensional figure in a novel because her character lacks development.

We tend to easily cross over between boundaries of physical space and time into personalities and complexities of individuals, and judge them harshly depending upon whether we like them or not.  Yet, human beings are comprised of complex levels of dimensions; it is only every now and then that we come across that 1-dimensional sociopath whose only desire is to satisfy one’s own cravings, one’s own focus and centrality of purposive intent which translates into evil.

Yet, despite the exceptions to the general rules of life, there are certain basic principles which one should follow when preparing, formulating and filing a Federal Disability Retirement application for the Federal or Postal employee considering a Federal Disability Retirement application, such as: Always consider one’s Human Resource Office to be 1-dimensional — i.e., not on “your side”, but on the side of “Management” and the Agency.  And: Never assume that OPM will consider your Disability Retirement application to be 3-dimensional (i.e., to be considered as being straightforward, easily interpreted and quickly resolved) — but instead is almost always 1-dimensional (i.e., to be considered suspicious and found wanting).

Or another 1-dimensional approach: Never assume that your Agency or the H.R. Office of your agency is anything but 1-dimensional; to be 3-dimensional would mean that they are empathetic, are looking out for your best interests, and would protect the privacy of your medical issues with the utmost of sensitivity and protectiveness.  For, in the end, the 1-dimensional approach is to be flat, uncaring and without complexity of concern for others.

Thus, when you were taught as a child that we live in a 3-dimensional world, you were misled because no one had told you about the Federal Agency’s or the Postal Service’s reaction upon learning that you will be filing a FERS Disability Retirement application because of your medical conditions, and that the world is ultimately a 1-dimensional universe without empathy or concern beyond one’s own self-interest.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Disability Retirement for Federal Government Employees: The last Edwardian

What does it mean to be an “Edwardian”?  The reign of Edward VII was brief, but its influence is often extended to periods both before and long after in an aggregation of understanding “trends” that were noted, and often idealized.

It is a period of little interest to most Americans, except perhaps when there is some vague reference during a period of a royal scandal or a royal wedding that somehow touches the fancy across the great ocean that divides.  And despite our English “roots”, scant attention is paid to the history of England in either schoolbooks or offered curricula, except in referring to those dastardly “redcoats” who quartered themselves uninvited and had the audacity to tax its colonies without proper representation in Parliament.  Or so the memory of one’s childhood history lessons are recalled.

That period — whether one extends it some decades before, or well into the “Roaring Twenties” — actually lasted only from 1901 – 1910, but left a romanticized memory of lazy summer days, prosperity, greater involvement of women and the “common man” into the political arena, and came to symbolize the dawn of the “modern era”.  Whether such an idealized recollection actually reflected any reality of the era is open to debate.  But, then, that is what we cling to when situations worsen, isn’t it — of an idealized “before” in contrast to the stark gloom of “after”?

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 Federal or Postal job, that desperate “clinging on” to one’s job may in part be attributable to the need to be that last Edwardian — of a “before” (before the onset of the medical condition) when life seemed more rewarding, when pain, discomfort or overwhelming anxiety was not only unthought of, but never occurred as an issue of consideration — who “after” the onset of the medical condition can now only recall the romantic period that once was.

Filing a 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, may not solve every problem that besets the Federal or Postal employee who can no longer consistently get to work and accomplish all that is required by the position; but it does allow the Federal or Postal employee to prioritize and focus more upon the reality of one’s current situation — one’s health — and not become entrapped in trying to be that last Edwardian.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Early OPM Retirement for Medical Incapacity: The many tomorrows yet to come

Does hope lie fallow when the basket of tomorrows become numbered too few?  When endless tomorrows lay before one’s imagination, too numerous to count that one need not bother, does that purport to show that one has a great quantity of hope, or merely that youth’s folly allows for a carefree tomorrow where an eternity of tomorrows can never be reduced to a handful beyond a few todays?  Can time and incremental portions of divided moments be quantified in that manner?

That has always been an anomaly for the undersigned writer — the quantification of time, as in the manner that religious beliefs are scoffed at when it comes to the story of genesis.  For, those who hold to the strict construction and literal meaning of the timeline of how old the earth is, count the obscure generational extensions of people who lived in former times, and somehow declare that the world is X-amount of years old.  How one can calculate with precision that which is not explicitly stated is a conundrum in and of itself, leaving aside the issue of whether time can be quantified if the order of the planetary system and our specific galactic orbit had not yet been established.

Evolutionists, of course, contend that the world was clearly created billions of years ago.  To both, the question is:  Tell me the logical difference between the following 2 statements — 1. The world was created a long time ago, and 2. The world was created billions of years ago.  Do humans have the capacity to imagine time beyond the present moment, or perhaps yesterday or a couple of days ago?  What does it mean to say to a person, “A type of human being walked the earth 10 million years ago”?  One can barely remember where one has placed the screwdriver used last week, and yet people want to put some significance upon a belief-system that purports to quantify time.

Ultimately, the question of whether one believes that the earth is a mere 10,000 years old, or billions of years in the making, is not a factual or scientific one; it is, a political condemnation that categorizes a person’s religious belief into a bifurcated system of: Is he/she “scientific” or “religious”?  In the end, time cannot be so easily quantified; rather, it is a basis of hope and an anticipation of a future yet to be resolved.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, such that the medical condition prevents the Federal and Postal worker from performing one or more of the essential elements of the Federal position, time often becomes paralyzed, much like our imagined world of dinosaurs and prehistoric images of those Pleistocene eras and beyond; and as time is unable to be made meaningful except in the here and now — by imagining the many tomorrows yet to come — preparing an effective Federal Disability Retirement application that lets you project a life beyond the present-day circumstances of pain, medical conditions and deteriorating health, is the singular differentiating way that humans can separate themselves from other species: with hope.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Postal & Federal Disability Retirement: Ritualistic Behavior

We persuade ourselves that only children play those games; of turning suddenly left, instead of right; of pretending to be asleep, only to unexpectedly open one’s eyes to test the reality of our surroundings; and other discordant acts in an effort to defy the predetermination of fate, as if the karmic principles governing the universe are subject to the vicissitudes of private thoughts.  But the anomaly of the unexpected is that, once a pattern of disjointed behavior itself becomes a monotony of the routine, the corridors of ritualistic behavior become entrenched and often prevents one from taking steps necessary to step outside of the proverbial box.

Conventional thought processes can themselves become ritualistic; thus do we believe that by neglect or avoidance, medical conditions will just “go away”; or that the increasing hostility and initiation of adverse actions by an agency will cease if we just “ignore” them; or if we just continue maintaining a semblance of competency, the incompetents will recognize and acknowledge the superiority of motives, and desist from the constancy of interruptive actions.  Such ritualistic behavior, however, has little to no impact upon the reality of the world, no more than when the child in us attempted to defy fate and the karmic gods which rule the universe.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, the route of exit from the madness of the universe is to file 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 plain fact is, no one cares for one’s health or well-being except the person who suffers from the medical condition, as well (one would hope) one’s family and spouse.

Reflection upon the priorities of life must always be reengaged; and continuing onward with vestiges of child-like ritualistic behavior, against all sanity telling us that things will not change despite our best efforts, will only prolong the agony and the angst of life’s unfairness.

Filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through OPM is available for those Federal or Postal employees who can no longer perform one or more of the essential elements of one’s positional duties, and while continuation with one’s agency or the U.S. Postal Service may be a laudatory goal revealing an undying sense of loyalty, it is the dying portion of our better selves which whispers the lie that ritualistic behavior can alter the course of human history within the microcosmic universe of karmic incantations.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

OPM Disability Retirement: Requisite Sense of Control

Most of us require a semblance of self-determination, if only to conceal the inadequacies and keep at bay the disasters which portend, or pretend, whichever the case may be.  By controlling circumstances, we believe that we can maintain prevention of crisis, pre-determine the outcome of expectations, and squirrel away the hesitations and insecurities controlling us in our lives of desperate needs.  But life has a way of defying the macro-minutiae of the limited universe within our reach and immediate control.

Mastery of life is difficult to attain; just when we thought we had grasped the foundational principles of life and living, old age sets in, and the youthful vigor dissipates, like the ethereal dust of residue left behind by the flight of angels.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers, it is that sudden onset of a medical condition which nags and refuses to go away, which becomes the harbinger of things to come.  Agencies and the Postal Service tend to be “meddlers”, and once a particular Federal or Postal employee becomes the trigger-sighted individual, the stray bullet that travels is normally not too far behind.  Loss of control, or the abandonment of a requisite sense of control, is derived when agencies target, and when adverse actions are issued, a PIP is imposed, and leave restrictions commanded.

Filing for Federal Disability Retirement is an option which is a viable avenue to pursue, precisely because it attains and reasserts that requisite sense of control, by securing a needed annuity for some semblance of financial security and stability.  OPM Disability Retirement is also a means of re-focusing one’s life upon the priorities which matter — such as one’s health and well-being, so that the harassment and hostility at work will cease.

But the long road in preparing, formulating, filing and waiting upon a Federal Disability Retirement application, filed ultimately through, and decided by, the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, is another bureaucratic morass which — for a time, at least — will feel like entering another and surreal universe where one’s destiny is in the hands of another: OPM.  But in life, as in the parallel universe of the absurd, one must first lose control in order to gain the requisite sense of control.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill
OPM Disability Attorney