My macbook pro will not recognize my WD external hard drive 1tb

My macbook pro will not recognize my WD 1 tb external hard drive that I have as my time machine backup. I worked just fine for a long time now The only way I can see it is through Disk utility. And when I try to repair the disk it say it cant be repaired, and i need to back up files and reformat. All my backups are on the hard drive. How do I back up the back if I cant get it recognized? Uggghhhhh I have several years of info on the hard drive .. PLEASE HELP!!!

Hi cterry66,
Welcome to the Apple Support Communities!
I understand you would like to reset the user account password on your computer but do not know the original password. If you set up your Apple ID with that user account, you can use that Apple ID to reset your OS X user password. Please use the information provided in the attached article to complete the process. 
OS X: Apple ID can be used to reset your user account password - Apple Support
Cheers,
Joe

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