MBP Not Recognizing External

I have an iomega 1TB external drive that I partitioned to use as a time machine backup and general external storage (movies, tv shows, etc). I've been using it like this for about 4 months, but starting this week, when i plug it in nothing shows up in the finder. If I spotlight a file name from the drive it still comes up and the drive(s) show up in my Disk Utility. Why won't it let me browse it with the finder? I can't think of anything I could have done to change it... I ejected the drive, unplugged it, turned the drive off, closed the computer to take to class, came back, plugged the drive in, turned the drive on, and... nothing. I didn't update anything or install anything, so I am at a complete loss, any help would be GREATLY appreciated...

Did you run a Repair/Verify Disk and Repair/Verify Permissions in Disk Utility?

Ran both the "verify disk" and "repair disk" in the disk utility as well as Option Click>"reveal disk in finder"

Still nothing.

If I "open disk" in disk utility, it opens a finder window that shows the contents, but there still isn't an icon under "devices" in the finder sidebar, so every time I want to access it I have to open disk utility to do so... what a pain...