Sorry about this bug... I know it's frustrating. But I have a tip for you. This bug can easily be reproduced. It happens, when you keep pressing the struggle button while being on the loading screen. So to avoid it, for now at least, please only press the struggle button once, to restart the game. This way this bug won't appear. Also, even if it appears, as long as you don't save, and just go back to the main menu, and load the game again, your items will be back.
I just recently managed to fix this bug, so it will only be fixed in 1.1.5 sadly.