Shortly after starting my hormone therapy, in 2018, my best friend introduced me to Amber McLaughlin, saying: “Amber could really use a mother right now.” Although we were in different prisons, we began corresponding regularly through written letters. We developed a close friendship in the few short years before she was executed by the state of Missouri.

Amber was 49 when she was put to death last year for a 2003 murder. Her execution was believed to be the first of a transgender woman in the U.S.

I think the main reason we bonded so quickly was due to our common childhood experiences. We had both been raised in a homophobic family environment. Court records indicate Amber was in foster care for a time. Her adoptive father, a police officer, paddled Amber with what the family called “a board of education.” Attorneys for Amber called her home a “house of horrors.” Her adoptive father would sometimes also use his nightstick or Taser to terrorize her, according to her petition for clemency.

We never talked about why she was in prison or how much time she was serving. Her execution was set for Jan. 3, 2023, three days after the Missouri Department of Corrections instituted a new policy that forbade correspondence between prisoners.

Looking back, I sometimes wonder if, in the hours leading up to the execution, Amber knew what was about to happen. According to transcripts of Amber’s 2006 trial, a psychologist testified that Amber had an IQ of 82. Her correspondence with me often read like a child had written it.

For her last meal, Amber asked for a cheeseburger, fries, a strawberry milkshake and some peanut M&Ms.

Sweet Amber would talk about how she had to hide being transgender for fear of another beating from her adoptive father. I know that fear; it’s one that reaches far into adulthood. It keeps you from showing your true self to the world. It wasn’t until Amber was in her 40s that she was able to introduce the world to the real Amber.

In the days leading up to her execution, Amber was accompanied by a spiritual advisor, the ​​Rev. Lauren Bennett of the Metropolitan Community Church of Greater Saint Louis. Bennett also was with Amber in the execution chamber, right up to Amber’s last breath.

Amber asked for our community to wear something pink on the day of her execution, in a show of solidarity. All of our incarcerated LGBTQ+ family wore pink lipstick, homemade fingernail polish or some other pink article. I spent the next two days in my bunk crying.

Amber told me she wished she could have come out many years ago. She found such peace, living openly as her true self. At Amber’s request, her body was cremated and her ashes given to her mother for placement next to her sister’s ashes. Her spiritual advisor walked Amber through that process as well. But Amber’s family, in a last act of transphobia, would not allow the name Amber to be used at the funeral. Amber’s ashes lie next to her sister’s, but the name on Amber’s urn identifies her by the birth name she hated her whole life.

I will never forget you, Amber.