Recovering 'My Library' Households

daisysimworld  Can you recover the folder from the trash, or did she “accidentally” empty the trash too after deleting the folder?

I'm so sorry this happened to you. Were your Sims ones you created in CAS? If so, then a copy the game makes of them when you click on the checkmark to start playing, should be there. I know it's a tough thing to start over, but sometimes it's also a good thing. I am the Queen of Restarts, although most of mine have been voluntary. Other times, it's when a glitch hits, or a patch.  Start that new game and then go into the Gallery from CAS, which is where you'll start out. Find your Sim(s) in your library and either merge or replace the Sim already in CAS.  Any builds should also be in your library, if you saved them. Good luck, dry your eyes and tackle this problem.

My other piece of advice: never lend this person your laptop again. Or make a backup of your game onto a thumb drive and lend away with no fears.

daisysimworld  Did your friend delete just the game files or did they delete the user folder that would be in Documents>Electronic Arts>The Sims 4.  From what you said since the game disappeared from Origin, if the The Sims 4 folder is still there in your Documents, you might be able to get everything back.  Although, since you reinstalled the game, it might have been overwritten and tbh, since you only have the New Game button, you've probably lost everything including your Library unfortunately.    You'll just have to look to see if it did or not.  If the The Sims 4 folder did get overwritten or is not there anymore, the only choice you have is the one PipMenace mentioned or to start over with a new game.  If The Sims 4 folder didn't get overwritten and is still there, possible in a renamed folder, you should be able recover it and use the Load button on the Main Menu to load your saves and pick right up where you left off the last time you were playing.  Here's hoping.

Hope this helps.

daisysimworld Your post has been moved to the Mac Tech forum for Mac specific help.

daisysimworld wrote:

she had ''accidentally" deleted the Sims 4 folder on my computer, thus uninstalling it from Origin also

For your understanding, deleting the Sims 4 folder from Documents > Electronic Arts does not uninstall the game from Origin. The only way the game can be uninstalled is either through the Uninstall option in Origin/EA App or manually trashing the base game app and the Sims 4 Packs folder.

We can do a thorough search of your Mac for your save files. Open Terminal (Applications > Utilities) and enter the following search command:

find ~ -type f -name "*Slot_*" 2>/dev/null

After a while it will return results if it has found any save files in your Mac user account. You'll know when the search has finished because the command prompt will reappear. Copy and paste the search results in a post here.