JW33, it would be helpful to know if the issue that caused the loss of your recorded programming was software or hardware related. You'll probably never know for sure, but if it's a hardware issue, it might happen again if you keep the same receiver.
The live chat person was probably saying you won't be able to recover your lost, recorded programming because your DVR stores content on the local, receiver hard drive rather than a cloud network. The best you'll be able to do is start checking on the availability of your lost programs On Demand and the Contour website. Make note of episode expiration dates and watch programs with the earliest expiration first, checking them off your list as you go. It will take some effort and will take longer to watch programs without fast forward, but you should be able to watch a lot of the programming that you lost. And, don't networks still re-run programs after the season ends? It might actually be possible to re-record some of it. That might take a while though, so just set your "Series Manager" option to record "First run & repeats" for the programs you aren't able to catch up on with On Demand and the Contour website.