We wrote letters to legislators, to the head of the Department of Corrections, and to the Governor, raising concerns about what we believed were serious Eighth Amendment violations. Repeatedly, it felt as though nothing was changing. It felt as though hope was running out.

Then something shifted in me. I began to realize that the Department of Corrections was not simply a labyrinth of uncaring people, but an overburdened system filled with human beings trying to manage impossible pressures. If I wanted someone to truly hear us, I could not rely only on legal arguments, even valid ones. I needed to reach the compassion of another person. I needed to speak not only as someone making a case, but also as someone asking to be seen.