Opened a ticket and here is the response I got:
TLDR: take off profession equipment, or talk to Mahra Treebender (found 3 places) to change how prof equipment is displayed.
Full GM Message:
"Technical Specialist [GM] here. =)
Sounds like you noticed your shield wasn’t showing up on your Shaman even though it was equipped.
The reason this is happening for you and other characters is due to “profession equipment”. Due to new changes to professions, when you have profession equipment equipped it will apply a visual buff to your character. You can see this buff if your mouse over it at the top right of your screen where the buffs show up. Right-clicking the buff for profession gear will remove it and that will get your shield to show up again.
If you open your Alchemy profession window, at the top right of that window you will see your profession equipment. Unequipping that item will make it so the buff doesn’t get applied to your character if you always want the shield to show up. You may chose to only equip the profession equipment when you are actively crafting, in order to get the bonus.
Lastly, Profession Equipment can be configured by speaking to Mahra Treebender, the Profession Equipment Specialist, who can be found in Valdrakken, Ohn’ahran Plains and the Waking Shores. Speak to her to configure various aspects of your profession equipment and how it’s displayed.
Hopefully this helps clear things up. Have a good one!"
Haven’t tried talking w/ the NPC yet, but just unequipping prof gear to my bags immediately fixed the issues w/ no reload