Local user data lost/reset when logging into domain for first time

[Serenastra]

Situation: Head has been logging into local account on her laptop, and now we want her to log into domain while in school to sync network data.

 

What I did: Logged off her local account (W7LAP019\head), then connected to network and logged into her network profile (ADMIN\head).

 

What happened: When I logged in on ADMIN\head, all looked fine, new desktop created as expected. I then tried to log into local account again to copy settings etc, only to find I could no longer access the local account - switching user to W7LAP019\head would not work - just got invalid username/password every time. Going back into ADMIN\head, I browse to C:\Users\ and see two accounts: Head and Head.ADMIN. Yet the C:\User\Head folders are all empty - like a newly-created user would be.

 

What did I do wrong? Is it because the two accounts had the same username that the local account was reset? And more importantly - if the documents folder in this user was deleted, what's the chance of me finding it again using a deleted file recovery program?