So for anyone who finds themselves in the same situation, the glove box can be opened by pulling down on a little plastic bar that runs horizontally (highlighted in red) from the lock mechanism to about 3/4 of the way along the handle space.
This bar is connected to the latch up above. The picture of the piece shown above usually pulls this down when the handle is pulled, so if this piece breaks and your glove box is not locked you can simply pull down as shown on the below images.
If like me you pull the entire handle off because you can't see anything you can simply remove the spring and pull the bar down much easier, but then of course you need to purchase an entire new handle.
Attachment:
GloveBoxLock_HandleRemoved42524352.jpg
Attachment:
GloveBoxLock_HandleRemovedOpt.jpg
Wouldn't it be great if we could upload images here that were more than 256kb
