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I can not highly recommend sleep training enough... It really saved our family's well being. We waited a little longer then your LO (8 months), but if I were to do it all over again I would sleep train earlier...

We wanted to CIO with checks, but in the end it didn't work for us. My LO would get more upset with me checking in on him and ended up doing extinction.

To answer your questions:

Did you start the timer from when you left the room, or from when baby first started crying?

When baby started crying

-When you went to check/soothe, what did you do?

Talk to my LO and let him know it is OK and it is sleep time

Did you ever pick up?

No

Did your checking actually do anything or just make it worse?

Made it worse, IMO

Did you just leave the room again even if the crying intensified, rather than baby calming down?

Yes, only stood for a few moments to reassure him I was there.

My LO never calms down from crying unless I pick him up so I'm not sure what the checks will accomplish. But I don't think I can handle extinction/full on CIO (at least not yet).

I thought the same thing about full extinction and it was hard, very hard, but I am very happy I did it.

-Did you apply the same method to night wakings, or only for bedtime? Jodi Mindell's book (recommended by my doc) says to do your regular routine for night wakings, the idea being that once they figure out how to fall asleep at bedtime on their own, they'll start to be able to do it for night wakings without having to "train" at 4 in the morning. Any thoughts on that?

My guy was already night weened, I hadn't given a bottle at night in months... I treated night wakes just like I put to bed, extinction.

-If you were still doing night feedings (which I am, EFF, currently down to typically 1 MOTN feed), did your LO drop the feeding after sleep training, or did that come later?

I couldn't answer this, maybe other can, but I have heard you can do the feeding and put down just like other wake ups.

-Did sleep training at night improve daytime nap sleep? LO is still doing the dreaded 30 minute cat naps and it's driving me nuts. Really hoping that might improve if nighttime sleep improves!

Yes!!! Once we switched to 2 naps, naps also got way better... We switched to 2 naps while sleep training.

We did Ferber with DS starting right at 4 months. We just started out training for falling asleep at night. Your description sounds exactly like what was happening with him so we figured if he was already crying anyway despite our attempts, we didn't have anything to lose. Sleep training was definitely one of the best parenting decisions we made (DS is now 2.5). Ferber took us about 3-4 days to get him falling asleep on his own at night, and he was soooo much happier after that. He has been a pretty good sleeper since then, too! Answers to your questions below, but let me know if you have any follow up questions:

-Did you start the timer from when you left the room, or from when baby first started crying? from when baby first started crying. if he calmed himself down, we started the timer over.
-When you went to check/soothe, what did you do? Did you ever pick up? Did your checking actually do anything or just make it worse? Did you just leave the room again even if the crying intensified, rather than baby calming down? We didn't pick up, just patted him and said it was time to sleep. Checks worked fine at that age, but he rarely needed them (i.e., he would get through 1-2 checks, but never cry long enough to go to the next interval if that makes sense)
-Did you apply the same method to night wakings, or only for bedtime? we started out just for falling asleep/bedtime. within maybe 2 weeks, he was down to one night feeding at a reasonable time (usually in the 2-3am neighborhood). prior to that, we were dealing with 3+ night wakings and taking forever to go back to sleep. we eventually trained out that last night feeding around 7-8 months (after he had shown he could go without on multiple occasions and was eating enough during the day), but it took maybe 1-2 nights?
-If you were still doing night feedings (which I am, EFF, currently down to typically 1 MOTN feed), did your LO drop the feeding after sleep training, or did that come later? DS had reflux so he kept 1 MOTN feeding until that was resolved/he was off meds and sitting up fulltime. I was totally fine with the 1 feeding as it was at a time he might reasonably be hungry and, after sleep training, he'd eat and go right back to sleep.
-Did sleep training at night improve daytime nap sleep? DS was an inconsistent napper for a long time, but once we sleep trained were able to put him down awake for naps too despite not ever doing any sort of nap training.

We sleep trained at 10 months using CIO with checks.

1. When we left the room
2. We had a phrase we would say. "Night night. I love you." If she was standing we'd lay her back down and repeat the phrase. We never picked her up or patted her back or stayed in the room for an extended period of time.
3. Only bedtime. We didn't sleep train to get her to sleep through the night but because she would no longer fall asleep while nursing.
4. Yes! About 2-3 weeks later she dropped her MOTN feedings on her own and started sleeping 12 hours overnight. She still sleeps 12 hours overnight. I think learning to self soothe was the key for her.
5. Um.... it got a little better. She started napping in her crib instead of in the car or on me. Her naps really improved when she dropped to one nap at 12 months.

@Goldengirl: he didn't cry too much at all. I think the first night he cried for maybe 15-20 minutes when we put him down. after that, most of the crying was he'd cry for 1-2 minutes, calm down, so we'd start the timer over, and then he'd never make it past that higher check level.

for the last feeding, he went a few nights in a row without waking up at all around 7.5 months. as a result, the next day he would be really hungry and then eat really well (solids + bottles) during the day, and the cycle would perpetuate where he wasn't waking up from being hungry at night. once we knew he could do it, there were a handful of nights where he woke up at his usual feeding time (2-3am) and DH went in and did Ferber soothing/checks. for those, we just started at the beginning Ferber intervals (I think 3-5-10?) and he never made it past the first check.

re: reflux -- the main symptom DS had was snacking and not wanting to take full feeds. so he'd snack all day and then eat better at night because he was sleepy. once his reflux improved (in our case, he was on Prilosec), we worked on getting him to take full feeds during the day, which then meant he was less hungry at night. solids improved the situation even more.