Amanda Knox Is Apprehensive, Can't Sleep as Murder Appeal Approaches

Nov. 5, 2010— -- Amanda Knox marks a grim milestone today, the third full year of living in a prison cell.

It was on Nov. 5, 2007 that the Seattle junior was arrested by Italian police and charged with murdering her roommate Meredith Kercher. Denied bail, Knox, 23, has not left prison since except to attend the murder trial that ended with her conviction and 26 year prison sentence.

During those three years, Amanda Knox has become a household name, with several books, a Lifetime movie and potentially even a Hollywood film depicting her life.

Knox's real life, however, is spent sitting quietly in a 129 square foot prison cell in the outskirts of Perugia, Italy.

"Amanda says prison is like not living because nothing changes. She says everything is the same incessantly," her stepfather Chris Mellas told ABC News.

Lately, Knox's cloistered world has been agitated. Her family says that Knox has had trouble sleeping as the Nov. 24 date approaches for the appeal of her murder conviction. She is apprehensive, but hopeful, they said.

Earlier this week, the third anniversary of Kercher's death was also noted. Several candles were left in front of the Perugia house that Kercher and Knox shared and where Kercher died, her throat gashed open amid signs of a sexual assault.

Knox, her former Italian boyfriend Raffaele Solecito and Ivory Coast drifter Rudy Guede were convicted of killing Kercher in what the prosecution claimed was a drug fueled rage against Knox's roommate.

"We miss Meredith more than ever," the Kercher family said in a statement released this week.

The mayor of Perugia announced a scholarship in Kercher's name, and even Knox's mother Edda Mellas said her thoughts drifted to Kercher's family on Monday evening, the anniversary of the murder.

"On the evening of the 1st, I thought of Meredith and of her family," Edda Mellas told ABC News. "I can't imagine how you would deal with the loss of a daughter, a sister as a family. It has to be beyond painful, beyond words."

Mellas and her family, however, are focused on helping Amanda Knox cope with prison.

The only break in monotony for Knox is visits with a family member, twice a week for an hour each time, in a room that Chris Mellas describes as a "blue-green, minty." It has a pair of doors, two cameras and a few windows where guards can watch. Mellas is currently staying in Italy to spend those two cherished hours each week with her.