sim 3 file nuked itself, is recovery possible?

hey everyone! so earlier i was playing my save on the sims 3 and every thing was normal. my sim had just finished her last semester at university and was heading back home. then the loading screen popped up, and when the game came to, my task bar was empty and my sim just vanished. my entire save file was wiped clean like as if i had started a new save. this is very frustrating and i am not familiar with sims 3 bugs but is this a common issue? i just want my sim to come back, i would really hate to have to restart her entire career all over again and have to rebuild all of her skills. i also literally just bought this game YESTERDAY, and i was so excited to play it. ive already tried moving my files around to see if i could find the original game file, but no luck. i even deleted my most recent save hoping that it would trigger the previous one to load. still, nothing. when i load up the game now, it just shows an empty household. if anyone knows a way to fix this, please share! i run the sims 3 on my macbook and really only have had minor issues with it up until now.