My game randomly crashed, *become a problem I've gotten used to* but this time my character was completely gone when I reopened the game!! How the hell is that possible, and is there any way I can just back up all my characters in case it happens again?
It is a pity that the mod is crashing constantly, because it is amazing. Perhaps the crash corrupted your character's save. Always try to make backups of your save files.
Do a copy of your save files EVERY TIME you play the game.
I keep two copies of my saves. It has saved MANY of my characters and a LOT of progress time in more than a couple occasions...