iMessages not restored from cloud in iPhone

Phone locked me out and I eventually had to restore from a cloud backup. iMessages were set on phone to the cloud. Once restored from my cloud backup, iMessages have not for five days reappeared on my phone. They are not showing as stored in the cloud. So what happened to them - they are supposed to either be in the cloud or part of a backup and are nowhere to be found. Also not in recently deleted. Note this is the only aspect of my iPhone that did not restore properly. Have spent hours trying to figure it out to no avail. iPhone 12 Pro recently updated to iOS 17.5.1. Thanks!