Company granted me stock that can’t sell

Hi all, im hoping i can get some advice on an issue im having regarding stocks. I have absolutely no knowledge of how any of this works so bear with me. One of my former HR directors reached out from a company I last worked for 6 years ago. Apparently when I was still there I was granted stock via E\*Trade. They told me I have quite an amount in there and I should verify my E\*trade account and accept my grants which I did. I followed all the directions I was told however my account still states I have no sellable shares. I asked them what I need to do next but they replied with this “Unfortunately, I have some bad news. When we went to release the grants, our attorneys let us know that any grant that was vested, but not accepted a year after vest date has to be canceled per our plan. This was something we never dealt with before and we’re unaware that that existed. So unfortunately, we cannot release these grants to you. I’m really sorry for asking you to accept the grants and going through the whole process and then having to come back and tell you that the grants are not releasable” Is there a loophole for this? Can I still get access to the money in, or is just going to stay there for no reason? I’m so confused and annoyed that I was told about this when I can’t even access it.