help! Time Machine deleted all my backups!

HELP!!!! So I reformatted my laptop and reinstalled Leopard. Kept my system name and User name the same, hoping TM would just pick up where it left off. I did not want a a full system restore, just selected folders (trying to avoid things that may have been corrupt). I left for dinner with my external HD attached while it was being indexed.

I came back to find that TM had deleted every single backup from today to last October. I wasn't done restoring things!!!

Is there any way to recover any of this data? I didn't think TM was just able to delete files without prompting me. I NEED THIS STUFF BACK!~

any help is greatly appreciated!

 

thanks. i tried that. the only date there is tonight (after the reinstall). everything else is gone. i'm running data recovery software on it now hoping to pull something off.