disability retirement for federal employees

Federal Employee Medical Retirement: Deprogramming a Preconditioned Approach

Posted onAuthorFederal Disability Retirement AttorneyLeave a comment

The preconditioned attitude of the general public is that, if X has a medical condition, then such medical condition, by the very nature of the condition itself, will either entitle one to benefits, or not. Such an approach is what one is conditioned to expect — that by the very nature of the medical condition itself, means that it will either lead to, or not lead to, a specified result. This viewpoint and approach is based upon a definitional standard, where the very essence of what it means to suffer from X already predetermines whether one is eligible and entitled to benefit Y. […] Read More …

Medical Separation from Federal Government Employment: The uncommon denominator

Posted onAuthorFederal Disability Retirement AttorneyLeave a comment

Why is it that the common denominator is always represented by the basest of related factors? The answer is simple, of course, and a tautology of sorts; for, that which is uncommon, by definition, constitutes a rare and prized feature, and through sheer economic application of supply and demand, the latter is heightened when the former is scarce. Thus, in issues of character and human essences, the core of an individual is represented by the base elements of evolutionary Darwinism, and would therefore constitute the most simplistic of instinctive drives; whereas culture, refinement and societal structures are developed beyond the commonality of base factors. […] Read More …

OPM Disability Retirement Pension Annuity: Today, life is good…

Posted onAuthorFederal Disability Retirement AttorneyLeave a comment

It is the set of 3 periods at the end of the sentence, identified in grammatical terms as an ellipses, allowing for a trailing thought or a hesitation of motive, and here which differentiates from a singular finality of a period postulated to prevent a purposive punctuality of partition from a postscript. If the last two periods were extracted and deleted, the delineation would connote a declarative assertion, unhesitant in conclusion, and confident in execution. With those two additions, it implies and denotes hesitancy, a pause leaving the impression of loss or lack of confidence, and unable to determine the cogency of opinion formulated but for the ellipses. […] Read More …

Federal Employee Disability Retirement: The last hurrah

Posted onAuthorFederal Disability Retirement AttorneyLeave a comment

We dream of those moments; the final word in a debate which devastates the opponent; the retort which wows the audience; the closing statement that persuades beyond a reasonable doubt; the performance of a lifetime which defines the value of life itself. The final breath taken, the last hurrah heard, and the concluding catapult left not as a dangling participle, but as a substantive grammatical perfection, leaves the participants and viewers in silent awe in the wake of the closing curtains descending as the roar of the crowd becomes muffled because of the thunderstruck performance left with little doubt or residue for an encore. […] Read More …

Federal and Postal Disability Retirement: Persuasive Impact

Posted onAuthorFederal Disability Retirement AttorneyLeave a comment

In preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether under FERS or CSRS, it is important not to confuse the difference between that which is central in proving one’s Federal Disability Retirement application, from that which is merely of persuasive import. In some cases, there may be a necessity, for very pragmatic reasons, to deliberately switch the two; but as a general rule, the argument for persuasive documentation should be used as secondary sources of proof. […] Read More …

Federal and Postal Disability Retirement: Choosing Battles

Posted onAuthorFederal Disability Retirement Attorney2 Comments

Human Resources departments within agencies are set up in order to perform a multitude of services for the employees who comprise the agency itself, and to that extent, the originating idea which constitutes the founding purpose is a noble one. For whatever reason, however, the foundational principles in the course of an evolving department will often get muddled and lost; the driving principle behind a concept merely gets in the way of a paycheck; the employees for whom the department was founded become the “problem” and an adversarial relationship between the H.R. Department and its employees arises.
[…] Read More …

Federal Employee Disability Retirement: Life Choices

Posted onAuthorFederal Disability Retirement AttorneyLeave a comment

We all have to make them; and though we may alternatively want to curl up into a fetal position and wish the blunt world to stop bothering us, the decisions we make, and take responsibility for, reflect the state of maturity which binds us to age, experience and level of moral maturity. It is, to a great extent, a superficial and shallow connotation and reference point; for, as the inevitability of choices to be made result from living in circumstances of our own making, so to imply that there is anything “substantive” in speaking about them undermines the very relevance of implication itself. […] Read More …

FERS & CSRS Disability Retirement: The Unending Cycle of Relapse

Posted onAuthorFederal Disability Retirement Attorney1 Comment

It is merely from a perspective of combined incrementalism with an admixture of hope and self-delusion that people talk about a “relapse”. The plain fact is, most medical conditions follow a fairly predictable and linear path of progressive deterioration, with critical junctures of static chronicity, and marked by charted moments of quietude interrupted with a fury of vengeful prose. If a business graph were to depict the pathway of most medical conditions, the ups and downs of the jagged lines would mesmerize and confuse us with contemptuous puzzlement. […] Read More …

OPM Disability Retirement: The Semblance of Joy

Posted onAuthorFederal Disability Retirement Attorney1 Comment

Happiness is but a fleeting moment; satisfaction is but the natural result of completion; but joy, that is a tincture derived from the depths of one’s soul. Perhaps there is an element of word-play; how we define levels of emotional states of being can depend upon the contextual usage of each conceptual construct, and in the end it is how we have described a given set of circumstances, based upon our personal experiential encounters and what sense of being we perceived at the time. […] Read More …

OPM Form SF 3112C and the Sufficiency of the Physician’s Statement

Posted onAuthorFederal Disability Retirement AttorneyLeave a comment

Confusing necessity and sufficiency is always a precarious matter. That which is necessary may not be sufficient for a given purpose, and failure in understanding such a fundamental distinction can be fatal to a Federal Disability Retirement claim. SF 3112C requires that a physician complete and provide essential medical information in the pursuance of a Federal Disability Retirement application. The form itself — SF 3112C — is the vehicle by which the medical documentation is obtained. […] Read More …