TLDR: My contact-napping, bedsharing 5-month-old got 5+ hours of independent sleep on his floor bed, no sleep training needed!
It's 1 a.m. and there is no one else up to share my excitement, so I figured I would post it here. Hopefully someone will find it encouraging!
We parent with a mix of AP, Montessori, and RIE influences. My LO (5.5 mos) contact naps either in a baby carrier or in arms, usually still latched after a feed. We've bedshared since week one--which was NOT my plan at all, until he had to have his tongue tie, cheek ties, and lip tie revised and was miserable, and it just didn't feel right not to be snuggling him all night. That prompted me to research safe bedsharing, and my perspective completely changed. It is one of my favorite parts of parenting and I would do it a thousand times over. It just feels...right! Like all is well with the world when our family is all together at night. And there is nothing like waking up in the morning to my sweet little one holding my face with both hands and "chatting"
That being said, there are days when it feels really hard to be "on" 24/7. If I am basically attached to him all the hours he is asleep, then his wake windows are all the time I have to shower, do dishes and laundry, cook, etc., and that feels unsustainable. We do prioritize independent floor time, but I still often feel like I'm barely treading water, and I certainly don't have time for any non-urgent projects, time with my spouse, or time to myself. Or even all the interactive time I want with LO on busy days (playing, reading books, making or enjoying music, doing sensory activities, etc.).
So, right about 4 months, as his sleep began shifting and he needed a much earlier bedtime, I started ninja rolling away in the evening after nursing him to sleep--first on our king bed, then on his Montessori-style floor bed in the nursery once he was rolling, bringing him to bed with me whenever he awoke and cried out after about 9. I resolved to respond immediately whenever he cried between his bedtime and mine and often ended up nursing him back to sleep and repeating the whole delicate process after every sleep cycle. There were so many frustrating evenings when I had to resettle him repeatedly and spent most of the time between 6 and 9 p.m. lying in a dark bedroom, listening to a podcast and hoping he'd unlatch so that I could finish my dinner or catch up with my husband, and wondering if this was my life for the indeterminate future. It didn't help that I had family members questioning my approach and friends helpfully recommending the sleep training programs they had used whenever I vented about the difficulty of the situation.
Flash forward to tonight, at 5.5 mos.--I ninja rolled away at 7:40, and he slept independently for OVER FIVE HOURS--double the record he set last night! Each time he stirred or opened his eyes momentarily, he got comfy again and put himself back to sleep. He even rolled off his floor bed and gradually ended up several feet away, haha, but he didn't seem to mind. He only called out for me and cried when he was ready for a feed.
I believed from early on that cosleeping, contact napping, high responsiveness, etc., would contribute to secure attachment and he would eventually be confident enough to take steps of independence when he felt ready, but of course as a FTM, I still had to bat away doubts that crept in during those hard moments--was what felt intuitively right to me actually best for my child? And I wondered if that independence might take far longer than I had anticipated. But here we are! I will cry the first night he actually sleeps until morning in the nursery, but I will know that he was able to choose that independence, at his own pace, fully of his own accord and according to his individual needs, because of the sense of safety cultivated by cosleeping.
It's 1 a.m. and there is no one else up to share my excitement, so I figured I would post it here. Hopefully someone will find it encouraging!
We parent with a mix of AP, Montessori, and RIE influences. My LO (5.5 mos) contact naps either in a baby carrier or in arms, usually still latched after a feed. We've bedshared since week one--which was NOT my plan at all, until he had to have his tongue tie, cheek ties, and lip tie revised and was miserable, and it just didn't feel right not to be snuggling him all night. That prompted me to research safe bedsharing, and my perspective completely changed. It is one of my favorite parts of parenting and I would do it a thousand times over. It just feels...right! Like all is well with the world when our family is all together at night. And there is nothing like waking up in the morning to my sweet little one holding my face with both hands and "chatting"
That being said, there are days when it feels really hard to be "on" 24/7. If I am basically attached to him all the hours he is asleep, then his wake windows are all the time I have to shower, do dishes and laundry, cook, etc., and that feels unsustainable. We do prioritize independent floor time, but I still often feel like I'm barely treading water, and I certainly don't have time for any non-urgent projects, time with my spouse, or time to myself. Or even all the interactive time I want with LO on busy days (playing, reading books, making or enjoying music, doing sensory activities, etc.).
So, right about 4 months, as his sleep began shifting and he needed a much earlier bedtime, I started ninja rolling away in the evening after nursing him to sleep--first on our king bed, then on his Montessori-style floor bed in the nursery once he was rolling, bringing him to bed with me whenever he awoke and cried out after about 9. I resolved to respond immediately whenever he cried between his bedtime and mine and often ended up nursing him back to sleep and repeating the whole delicate process after every sleep cycle. There were so many frustrating evenings when I had to resettle him repeatedly and spent most of the time between 6 and 9 p.m. lying in a dark bedroom, listening to a podcast and hoping he'd unlatch so that I could finish my dinner or catch up with my husband, and wondering if this was my life for the indeterminate future. It didn't help that I had family members questioning my approach and friends helpfully recommending the sleep training programs they had used whenever I vented about the difficulty of the situation.
Flash forward to tonight, at 5.5 mos.--I ninja rolled away at 7:40, and he slept independently for OVER FIVE HOURS--double the record he set last night! Each time he stirred or opened his eyes momentarily, he got comfy again and put himself back to sleep. He even rolled off his floor bed and gradually ended up several feet away, haha, but he didn't seem to mind. He only called out for me and cried when he was ready for a feed.
I believed from early on that cosleeping, contact napping, high responsiveness, etc., would contribute to secure attachment and he would eventually be confident enough to take steps of independence when he felt ready, but of course as a FTM, I still had to bat away doubts that crept in during those hard moments--was what felt intuitively right to me actually best for my child? And I wondered if that independence might take far longer than I had anticipated. But here we are! I will cry the first night he actually sleeps until morning in the nursery, but I will know that he was able to choose that independence, at his own pace, fully of his own accord and according to his individual needs, because of the sense of safety cultivated by cosleeping.
Cheers to a solid 5 hours of independence! 
So nice to hear the experiences of like-minded parents!