She's one of 18,000 people waiting for a presidential pardon. She knows an answer may take years.

Sarah Carlson has been on a decade-long path to redemption since her arrest in 2009. Recently, she bought her first home, completed an internship in addiction counseling, and will soon work toward a degree in social work. 

But Carlson has encountered several roadblocks along the way. The Minnesota resident often struggled to secure both housing and work. As a convicted felon, Carlson had to apply for an exemption with the state to work with vulnerable adults with addiction — she had to prove her crime was nonviolent. 

"I'm just at a point where I don't want to have that stigma when I go and apply for another job, or I go into my next school that I'm going to go into because you have to do fingerprints when you go to school and you have to do a background check with that school," Carlson explained. "Everywhere I go there will be background checks and I don't want that to be a hindrance for my future."