When I open my document in Word, the Table of Contents shows down the side of the document, but I cannot find anything of the document itself. It just shows me a blank page. When I look at the size of the file, it is the right size, i just cannot see anything. What am I doing wrong?

See if text has been formatted in white color or, possibly, as hidden.

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Stefan Blom
Microsoft Word MVP

Microsoft 365 apps for business
Windows 11 Professional

Good thought, but that does not appear to be the case, because I can only look at one page. No matter what I do with the index on the side, only one page appears. I had been indexing my document and was trying to hide the field codes when the entire document became inaccessible.

Have you tried Open and Repair?

Note that posting the file here would also help; then the community could have a look at it.

__________________
Stefan Blom
Microsoft Word MVP

Microsoft 365 apps for business
Windows 11 Professional

I am not sure how to Open and Repair. I researched it in the Microsoft Office Help, but could not find a reference to it. I am happy to attach the file.

Attached Files

Recipes V2.docx (167.9 KB, 13 views)

This appears to be a corrupted document. Any chance you saved it to mobile media or opened it from mobile media (i.e. a memory stick)?

BTW, it downloads as Recipes V2.docx.doc.

I did save it to an external hard drive, but as a copy and paste from my C: drive. Interesting on the extensions. I will look at that.

I do have an earlier version, I just did not want to lose the three hours work that I had done on it. However, given that the file is corrupted, it seems to make sense to throw it away and work from the earlier version. Thank you very much for trying to help.

If you want to try Open and Repair, here's how to do it: Display the Open dialog box from within Word, for example by pressing Ctrl+O. Locate the (possibly) damaged file and click it. Click the arrow on the Open button and then choose Open and Repair.

__________________
Stefan Blom
Microsoft Word MVP

Microsoft 365 apps for business
Windows 11 Professional

Thank you for explaining how to get to Open and Repair. Unfortunately, that did not work either. Oh well, it was worth a try.

I just had a thought. I have Vista 64 bit operating system, but I noticed the other day, that my version of Office is 32 bit. Would that cause me problems?

No, unless you have some reason to use the 64-bit version of Office, you should be using the 32-bit version. The 64-bit would be useful for very large complex Excel spreadsheets.

BTW, What you are seeing on the left side is the navigation pane. A TOC would be text in the document.

OK so I guess I should clarify. I can see the navigation pane, but nothing from the document. And, when I click on something in the navigation pane - hoping to go to a section of the document, nothing happens.

Should I just assume the file is corrupted and forget about it?

I think so at this point.

Here is one more link for you to explore:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/918429

Thank you for your help.