Sorry for such a long post, but I desperately need some advice! Here is the background - my LO (who is almost 8 months now) has always had a tough time sleeping. He would only sleep on me initially so we co-slept until he was about 3 months old. At that time, we discovered the miracle blanket so from 3-5 months he slept mostly in swaddled in the arms reach co-sleeper. He had a rough 6 week long 4 month sleep regression and was waking every two hours. As we got closer to 5 months, he was breaking out of his swaddle so much we ended up doing a lot more co-sleeping. He got too big and too active for the arms reach so we attempted to transition him to his crib, which did not go well. I should probably note that I've always nursed him to sleep. We tried baby Merlin magic sleep suit but it didn't help. We ended up co-sleeping again.

By the time he was 6 months, I was ready to sleep train- it was an extremely difficult decision for me, but Co-sleeping wasn't working well and my work was really suffering. We decided on the 5 minute check-in approach. It was brutal for me, so my husband did the check-ins. After a few days we saw huge improvement. It was going well for a few weeks and then he started regressing (most likely due to teething). It got so bad it was impossible to be consistent so we ended up co-sleeping again. Once his tooth had cut through, we decided to re sleep train. At first it was going okay (just like the first attempt), but after a couple weeks he started to regress again. There were a handful of nights where I'd fall asleep in the glider because I was so exhausted and the lack of consistency made everything worse. Two days ago, after three weeks of the second attempt with sleep training, I told my husband I couldn't take it anymore. It was too tough on our LO and me and after almost two months I just felt like it wasn't right for us. He's supportive, but I know it's hard on him since this means we get very little time alone together.

So here we are - co-sleeping again. It isn't great, but it works okay. The dilemma is this - I truly feel that co-sleeping is what's best for me and my LO. I would be okay with co-sleeping, HOWEVER I'm really concerned about getting him out of the bed later and our future family plans. We're planning on trying for a second when LO is around 15 months. The idea of needing to transition to the crib before baby arrives seems really scary and stressful to me. In addition, if we're co-sleeping and nursing a lot at night, I know it will be less likely that I will get pregnant again.

Part of me thinks don't worry about the future, just do what's best for the family now. And the other part says, the transition will be way worse later.

If we were to attempt sleep training again, I was thinking maybe during the night time feedings my husband could go in with a bottle instead of me nursing. I hate the idea of this, but am thinking this could really help us be consistent and would reduce the likelihood of us failing again.

I'm SO torn. thoughts? Advice? Food for though?
Thanks!!