When did you 'figure out' your 'sexuality' or have you never really understood it?

It sounds like you haven't been able to sort out sexuality and sociality issues which, admittedly, and extremely interwoven. I never questioned my sexuality. Part of that probably can be growing up on a ranch where at a very early age you are told no, the rooster isn't picking on the hen, why the bull has been brought in and no, he is not fighting with the cow, etc. The other part being that around 10 my mother -- my parents weren't up to having THE talk -- gave me a book from the library for my further education on the subject. (Well, she was a teacher, and my homeschool teacher by necessity at the time since I was bedridden for 4 years during puberty.)

But I had been attracted to girls even before that. There never was a question in my mind about my sexual preference. But when I returned to school as a teenager and all those tomboys I had had crushes on now had hips and things, and talked funny, I had no clue on how to interact with them. Or with guys, for that matter. No experience in socialization skills during that critical developmental period. It took me until I was 21 and nearly finished with university to have my first date. Took me another five years to find a modicum of learning how to have a relationship with a woman that wasn't totally platonic or totally, full blown, over-the-top, crushing infatuation & lust that sent them fleeing.

Good luck with YOUR search for the right balance.

I can vividly remember when I was around 8 or 9 years old and my mom's younger sister, my aunt, was babysitting me. She told me to get a bath, so I went and got in the tub and closed the shower curtain while I was in there. A few minutes later, the shower curtain sprang open and she was looking at me!
I was mortified and angry, no one outside of my mom had seen me naked for years.
She was looking directly at my thingy!
I yelled at her to get out and she eventually did.
That was the first time my "little man" tingled a bit that I can remember.
I think that one event, which I can still see vividly in my mind today, triggered something in me.
I won't go into what that may be...lol

What would you be hoping for in working out or discovering your sexual orientation? It seems to me that if you continue to live life alone it really doesn't matter, and if you are hoping for an intimate relationship then compatibility with another human would be much more important than working out beforehand what your desires are. They can and do change. But maybe I'm missing something?

Ok I grew up mostly straight and had several girlfriends, married several times, but did like being penetrated anally (clean only). My favorite thing has always been going down on women, but through the years I tried anal sex with guys a few times and mostly liked it. I never tried oral with guys until in my 50s, both receiving or giving. When I was very young a guy friend my age and I tried anal sex, I tried penetrating him but it wouldn’t go in, however when his turn came he got it in me. Honestly I didn’t hate it but thought it felt weird. I called myself straight but curious, now I’m fully bi.

I remember there being a period of realizing I was bi, I think I was 13 or 14. It didn't last too long, since I was already fine with the concept of queerness. I didn't have internalized homophobia or anything like that.

When I was about 10 years old and about 1 year prior to entering puberty which happened when I was 11, I had been very athletic. I was heavily involved in group sports at school and at the local YWCA on weekends and would always hang out at the town public pool on Saturdays with my sisters and our mom.

What I began to notice at the town public pool in our rural town, was that everyone would always be staring at me as we'd run around the pool area. I always thought it was because of the home-made kid-bikinis our mom had made for my sisters and I which were made out of bulky-knit wool and were all the same color, which was purple.

When boys or girls my own age began staring at me in particular, I began to feel something I'd never felt inside myself before. I had begun to literally 'feel' a person's stare. I could feel a person staring at me. I could feel the energy from their eyes it seemed. I could feel in my body, where they were looking and 'what' they were looking at. I was taller than most girls my age, very stick-thin and with very blonde short hair, all of which was the opposite of every other girl who ever showed up at the pool.

I suddenly became very popular at the age of 10 for no apparent reason, mainly I thought because they were all jealous of my purple hand-made bikini! But there was more to it than that!

I realized in my kid's mind that my body was behaving like a lightning rod in that it would attract attention to itself, attract other people's energy, even the energy of moms who'd be sitting around the pool's edge just like my own mom would do.

I didn't even have to say anything at all to make this happen... I could draw attention to myself just by being as quiet as a mouse as I walked from one end of the pool to the other. As I walked, I could feel a dozen sets of eyes penetrating my skin like they were laser lights shining on me.

I thought it was funny that people were attracted to me, but then again this only happened as I was just about to enter puberty. As I entered puberty at the age of 11, it suddenly occurred to me that I could 'turn-on' or 'turn-off' this magical power I had recently discovered about myself. It was in conjunction with the onset of my pubescent years that followed that I discovered what being 'female' appeared to be all about from a biological perspective.

It was therefore at 11 years of age that I figured out my own sexuality and how I could control the attention of others with my new-found sexual awareness.

When I met my husband, before that I didn't get a great deal out of sex.

I figured out I was attracted to full figured women at about age 12