Is this what's going on? I have an account with a maiden name I check now and then. I tried to get into it when they announced the policy change around inactive

Is this what's going on? I have an account with a maiden name I check now and then. I tried to get into it when they announced the policy change around inactive accounts, but was presented with an error saying I had no recovery information. I swore there was a recovery email and could see the security alerts being forwarded to other accounts, but can't do anything. With so many people centralizing on gmail over the years, this really feels like another blow to the usefulness of email overall. It has me thinking more critically around recovery workflows I've built or assumptions that people will have records of previously sent messages.