Develop history missing / corrupt catalog?

[tylers73957003]

This all started when I (finally) decided to backup my lightroom catalog, which I hadn't done in a very very long time (I know, very stupid). In the middle of updating, lightroom closes and a pop-up appears to say there was an issue with my catalog and that it needs to be repaired. Lightroom repairs the catalog, but once I open the new catalog, my develop history is 100% gone. 

After this happened, a new folder titled "corrupt catalogs" appeared, which allowed me to access my catalog WITH the history -- the only issue is with that catalog now, the AI remove tool settings, as well as the AI mask settings are gone, and must be manually reset. Given that I'd rather have my develop history, I figured I could live with having to redo some photos where the AI settings are concerned. However, whenever I go to back up this catalog, the same issue occurs: lightroom crashes, says it must be repaired, and then it repairs to new catalog without the develop settings. I feel it wouldn't be wise to go forward with that catalog if I can never back it up.

I read another post about develop history going missing after updating LR, but I don't believe I upgraded LR in this case? Is there any way for me to "import" or sync my develop settings onto the repaired, new LR catalog I haveto use now? Anyone have any similar issues?

Currently running MacOS Sequoia, LR 14.0.1

[dj_paige]

Lightroom repairs the catalog, but once I open the new catalog, my develop history is 100% gone.

Did you re-import the photos into the repaired catalog?

Do the photos reflect the final edits, just the history is missing?

[tylers73957003]

No, I didn't re-import anything. Once I clicked repair, it did its thing and created a new catalog. From the new catalog, everything looks to be the same (all final edits are there), just missing the develop history.

[dj_paige]

Since you don't have any recent backups, I don't think you can get the develop history back.

[tylers73957003]

What if I created a brand new catalog, but then imported from my old, corrupted catalog? Because like I said, the only real issue with that is that the AI corrections have to be redone, but at least all the history is there. The only issue with it is that I can't back it up because it says it's corrupt. Do you think that would work?

[dj_paige]

What if I created a brand new catalog, but then imported from my old, corrupted catalog?

By @tylers73957003

That might work, or it might not work. It depends on how serious the corruption in the file is. The only way to find out is to try it.

[tylers73957003]

To update:

Since I was still able to access my corrupted catalog that had all the develop history, I ended up exporting the entire catalog and then opening a brand new catalog, where I imported it back in. It crashed halfway through, which forced LR to repair it. With the repair, it still had all of the develop history AND I was able to back it up, making it a viable option going forward. The only thing was that the catalog was missing a few hundred photos, which i was able to determine when looking back through which folders were missing photos. For those, i ended up exporting the individual folders from the corrupt catalog, and imported them into the new catalog without issue.  

[dj_paige]

Good news! Now, make regular and automated backups of your catalog file, no excuses!