ALL of the emails in my Hotmail/Outlook.com account are gone.

ALL of the emails in my Hotmail/Outlook.com account are gone.  I have not logged into the account for some time, but do not understand why all the emails were removed.  Where have my emails gone?  I have had these emails for years and would like to recover them as soon as possible.  I have already checked the Deleted Items folder and there is nothing there.  If the account was deemed "inactive", why was there no notice sent to my alternate email address?  How can I request that these emails be recovered?