$self is probably not a reference to an object, unless you've done something like this:

my $object = Class->new();
my $self = \$object;
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That's important, because you're doing nearly everything else right. Without seeing your code, I expect you may be doing something like this:

$object->restore();

sub restore {
    my $self = shift;
    $self = restore();
}
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Unfortunately, since $self is declared as a lexical in the method and is shifted off of @_, the object is overwritten inside of the method with the restored code without updating the object itself.

Possibly the best way around this is to return the new $self from the method. If you're concerned about interface purity, why not make a deserialization constructor? Another option is to take advantage of Perl's pass by reference semantics, operating directly on $_[0].

sub deserialize {
    my $class = shift;
    return $class->restore();
}

sub restore_me {
    $_[0] = $_[0]->restore();
}
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