Why I almost quit playing

I didn't play for long jet (maybe 20 h) and mostly enjoy the game. I was geared up with all the weapons and armor available from the forest (bronze and copper stuff) and went exploring using a boat. Found a swamp in the direction of the waypoint I got, explored a bit and died.

Got my stuff back in a few attempts and got a portal to a nearby normal biome, then I found a plains biome by boat and thought that it seems like a nice place. Saw some mosquitoes and thought that they are some low level enemies because I can one shot them.

But then one attacked me and did over 80 damage killing me instantly.

I tried multiple times to get my stuff back, always needing to craft a new raft per attempt but didn't even come close to my grave.

I stopped playing for a few weeks because recollecting all the resources I lost didn't seem like a fun thing and I lost motivation.

Today I tried getting my stuff back again, of course unsuccessfully.

Because I didn't want to basically throw away the game I turned to the dark side.
I manipulated the games RAM to fix my health to 100(saying how I did it would probably violate Rule 6)

Got my stuff back and removed the hack again.
What did I do wrong to get in this situation and what should I have done to get out of it?