How to retrieve photos from iCloud Photo Library

Hi, so I activated iCloud photo library about 2 days ago with the optimize optimize iPhone storage option checked. Since then it has uploaded around 2000 out of 40000 photos in my phone to the cloud..

And then I started to noticed that it is not the best option for me since it took so long for me just to see a full res photo and video back on my phone. So I decided to undo this action and deactivated iCloud Photo Library. When I did that for the first time it gave me 2 options, delete the photos or download the photos from the cloud back to my phone. I chose the 2nd option. With download and keep originals checked now.

I look at the photos app it still says uploading, so I go back to settings and go to manage iCloud and I select photos and I disable and delete the iCloud Photo Library. It then said that I have 30 days to re download all the photos stored in the cloud before it will be deleted forever.

Then I go back to photos and it finally says then downloading 20xx originals.. I waited and waited and waited for hours but the numbers did not reduce not even by 1. But, every time I opened a picture that has been optimize for storage earlier (and after it downloaded the full res) finally the number decreases by 1. So I realized somehow I have to open each and every 2k++ pictures to get it full back to my phone, manually. First of all that sounds ridiculous if you ask me, and also I don’t know which one of the pictures have been optimize in the first place anyway, I couldn’t possibly go through each and every 40k, could I?

And then I started to look for a solution, one of which is to signed out from iCloud and signed back in. I did that and suddenly, all the pictures that have been optimized (2k++) disappeared from my phone.

It seems that there’s nothing I can do to retrieve them back to my phone at all. They are now stuck in iCloud and I can’t bring them back to my phone automatically. These photos used to be organized on my photos app and by downloading them manually to my computer would disorganized them all over the place.

And now every time I try to deactivated iCloud Photo Library, the phone doesn’t even ask me the “delete or download photos” options anymore. And even when I disable the iCloud Photo Library at manage iCloud settings, it doesn’t do anything at all anymore.

Please help, what should I do to retrieve all the pictures back to my phone?

Thanks in advance!

FYI: I am using iPhone 6+, 64GB. 2k++ photos stored in iCloud are 2gb in size, and I currently have over 8gb free space on my phone.