Lost Gear From Character After 2017 Server Merge

I have been a long time player of SWTOR since 2013 and enjoy it immensely but was required to quit playing due to school and other responsibilities in 2017. I logged back in on 6/22/2018 after the server merge of The Shadowlands server to the Starforge server in 2017; when I logged onto my main character "Velius-bowen" I was required to rename him. The character select screen showed him as a standard Trooper at level 3 and no gear, I renamed him to "Steinar-Bowen" and his appearance and level returned. I then proceeded to log onto that character but soon discovered that he was a level 3 Trooper class with no credits, gear or appearance items of any kind. This was a character that I have played as for four years. Some extreme error must have occurred after the renaming process but I can't seem to find others with this issue explicitly on the forums (maybe I'm just not looking hard enough?); most have only lost an item or two but I've lost everything. I would love to keep playing but this is game breaking for me. Can you please see if there is anything you can do? I just can't come back to the game after losing a character like this.

I copy of this post was also emailed to swtor support email

PS: I'm not sure if this can help but the "Character Rename" section of my account still has my original character listed.