What I would do at this point since you only have 489 photos, is airdrop them from your old phone to your new phone and then make sure your new phone has iCloud Photos enabled. Using iCloud Photos is the easiest way to have your photos transfer over to your new phone or to get them back if you have to restore the phone you’re using. With that said, before doing that, I would just leave it plugged in overnight and connected to WiFi and if there’s no change in the morning, do the above.
Funny, i think i found the issue......
Problem: In Ios 12 GM, the option to back up your photo library, specifically under icloud backup (not Icloud library or backing up photos in icloud)....did not always show up. I don't know HOW this happened if its supposed to be the same build as ios12 public release but it did.
Solution: So I went to the icloud library and toggled actual icloud library (not the option above under icloud backup) on and off....all of a sudden the "icloud backup photo library" showed up again......now when i redid another back up....its taking a full 10min to back up on the old device. It never took this long before. Now I am going to reset the XS and restore from backup again.....hopefully this works.
I know it sounds confusing.
Moral of the story: This is why I still dont trust betas....even the GM screwed me.