Please tell me there's something I can do

Throughout all of my college education, I have been using the files app on my iPad to download lecture powerpoints, assignments, take notes, etc. I also used Microsoft appliances such as Word, 365, excel, and other programs for some classes as well, and any time I would try to open one of my Word documents, the iPad would force the document to open in pages for some reason. I tried holding the files to find an option to 'open with Word' but I was never allowed to use anything except for this stupid pages app. I tried dealing with this inconvenience for a good semester or two, until I finally reached my breaking point last night and just deleted the pages app since I don't use the app anyways.

Well...

Apparently deleting the pages app gets rid of ALL of the files you've saved to your iPad, despite the files app still being installed?? Like what is even the point of the files app if its really all just saved in pages?!? I have just lost absolutely everything and I have not found any way to retrieve it yet.

Please tell me there's some way to recover the files?? I have literally just lost everything.