'Reverse' remote wipe

(Oh jeez, I already know with a title like that I might get a few s******s.)

I've just attempted to connect my personal phone to my work outlook email account, and during the process decided I didn't want to proceed. I didn't want to increase my phone security settings from swipe to pin or password.

Before I could delete the account off, the phone undertook a remote wipe from my work account after it tried to automatically sync the work account and failed. I'm sure it's an automatic setting from Outlook, but work are refusing to support it as it's not a work phone, and ALL my SD card data has gone, including my regular backups.

I am gutted. I was trying to reverse it. Not lose everything!

I had a nice chirpy email to my work account confirming that yes, Outlook had performed a remote wipe.

Any ideas guys? The internet is not being helpful!

The microsoft website 'helpfully' advises:

After a remote device wipe has occurred, data recovery is very difficult. However, no data removal process leaves a mobile device as free from residual data as when it's new. Recovery of data from a mobile device may still be possible using sophisticated tools.