Links to Entity items not showing in leads or contact panel

[juliograhamia]

I have two entities (interests, referral source) which have many-to-many relationships with leads and contacts. In the lead detail panel I have a place where I can link to multiple records in the interest entity. It works fine, I can select, delete, etc and it updates the record and the database. When I look at the interest entity I can see the leads and contacts linked.
HOWEVER, when I go back to the lead view / edit screens, the linked records do not show up - they did when I saved the record but are now not visible - I only see 3 dots ... and when I select the field to update again - nothing is selected.

Any ideas on where to start looking for the problem will be appreciated.