Folders not showing up in Lightroom Classic following mess up on HD

[minimejdh]

I have a MacBook Pro and use LrC v 14.5.1.  My photos are stored on an external HD.

What happened:  The first thing I noticed that in the Library module my entire folder heirarchy was no longer showing.  I didn't have a folder name that was grayed out with a "?", they just weren't there.  So I went to my xHD and while trying to figure things out, I wrongly changed a primary folder for my photos further messing up the association of folders/photos with LrC in the Library Module.  I have been trying to re-associate the folders and photos by searching for missing photos and then finding the location of individual photos.  This causes some of my folders to appear. When I available as an option, I synchronize a folder to bring more photos in.
Questions:  1) Why weren't my folders showing in the first place?; 2) Why aren't my folders showing grayed out with ? marks?; 3) Today when I first opened LrC my folders were showing and then when I tried to do the linkage, they disappeared again?; 4) Am I going through the process correctly?

[minimejdh]

The other strange thing is that when I refresh Missing Photographs, it shows photos that aren't missing anymore.  It is difficult to keep trrack of what I have successfully downloaded.

[dj_paige]

1) I don't know. A guess is that you accidentally opened the wrong catalog file. Please search all your disks for files whose name ends with .LRCAT, using Mac Finder to do the search, then open each catalog file found in LrC

2) Same as #1

3) They don't disappear. They move to the location you linked to.

4) Apparently not, although without being able to see what you are doing, its hard to say.

[minimejdh · Accepted solution]

Igor it solved by adobe support after around 2 hours.  They started with an older backup catalog.