Kind of an extension of this thread I found that was closed:
How to Save When Photoshop Crashes!!! - Envato Forums
The solution I found was to open another .PSD file (opened a completely blank grey page) and minimize the window (started working after this).
I was panicking hard (there was a few hours worth of work that I hadn’t saved ripperoni) when it stopped responding and I waited for hours in hope that it will somehow resolve itself but I tried this just before I gave up and forcefully closed Photoshop. But ah, lesson learned, always always save.