fifteenyconfusion

Hello, everyone. About 12 years ago, when I was 10, my parents were sponsored into the US by my uncle. I was then approved for a green card. Two or three years later, my parents left the country due to their parents' urgent medical conditions and brought us along with them. I never returned to the US for just under 8 years after that. Then, January of 2022, I came back via SFO airport and was held back for questioning. Over the 3 hour process, I was grilled on what I had been doing over the 8 years since I'd left, and had to pay a $585 fine to fill out and submit an I-193. They also put on my passport, "ARC OUT 8 years, ACH RES REQ's". A month or so after that, I went through the green card renewal process and got the renewed green card about 8 months later. I am currently a software engineer working in Seattle. I have not been in so much as been in a traffic stop, and file my taxes fine every year. In about 2 years and 6 months, my 5-year continuous residence will be up and I plan on applying for naturalization then. It is hard to find people with similar situations to me on the internet, and different sources say different things, ranging from Don't worry at all and submit, they don't care about your travel history past 5 years. Submit, but expect a lot of questions and a possible denial. Don't submit at all, they may look at your past travel history and decide you shouldn't even have gotten a renewal and may give you a notice to appear in court and deport you. My questions to the knowledgeable people on this sub are: When submitting my naturalization, do they care about travel past 5 years? Will the stamp on my passport give me problems (should I put that in with my application)? Are they able to look up travel information from that time I was out of the country, and will that cause issues? Do I need to hire a lawyer when I start my naturalization proceedings? Thank you very much in advance.