Just want to check if I understand what you're asking:
Did you exercise an option to buy shares at a price below the market value, and thereby incur a tax liability?
And if you did, am I right in saying that you could have just sold the shares as soon as you bought them, realised a profit, and paid the tax out of that?
If thats the case, I'm not quite sure what grounds you feel you would have to get special treatment, if you freely chose to speculate on the shares increasing in value? You'd just have to accept that you gambled and lost...
(Or maybe I've misunderstood your situation, in which case sorry!)