My 16 month old decided to sleep on his own

Last night. With no pressure and barely any prep work - see time line below. I didn't really work on it at all. We co slept since he was 3 months old and was waking pretty much every 30 mins - hourly. He had started just waking up a few times a night and was waking me up doing really quick cries before he repositioned himself and went back to sleep so I decided it might be time to put him in his own bed as I was getting worse sleep than his at this point.

Timeline went like this

Decide to put him in his own bed in December but we had family coming over for new year so would wait to do it until Jan.

Sleep starts going awful again one week at the beginning of Jan (maybe even the week before). I finally get around to emptying the grown out of clothes from the unused cot and husband takes the side off and transitions to a toddler bed on a Sunday (maybe 1.5 weeks of me not sleeping more than 45 mins to an hour at a time)

Naps in the toddler bed Sunday and Monday, I lay down to nurse him then get up and leave the camera on like I do with our king floor bed normally.

Monday I'm having a breakdown from serious lack of sleep, it's finally started to really take its toll on me and I can barely drive let alone parent. My nipple has ended up grazed from a bad latch with teething and only one of my boobs works so the constant nursing is agony. I've had the tv on most of the day for him because I can't be assed at this point and I can be pretty judgy about screen time. He can't be settled any other way. My husband tries to rock him to sleep while I walk the dogs to give him chance, he screams and cries for me until I come home. I phone daycare Tuesday morning and get him in an extra day (normally only does two half days). He does a full day on Wednesday because I am still just on the edge of a breakdown over being next level exhausted and considering going to hospital and demanding medical testing to find out what's going on to still cause this bad sleep at this age (we do have an ear problem we are waiting for grommets for).

Wednesday night I am crying in the night from pain nursing until at 2am I decide I'm night weaning. and sit on the rocking chair with him hitting me and thrashing around for an hour until he falls asleep. He sleeps from 3-6 after this. I have since decided against night weaning as I don't think either of us are ready so my hearts not in it).

Thursday night we are reading books in his room after bath and PJs and he starts to ask for boobie. I say we have to lie down for bedtime boobie and he lies on his bed???? So I think ok we can try if you want to sleep there, nurse to sleep.

He wakes up a couple of times before we go to bed and my husband is like are you going to bring him to our bed?? Am like yeah I don't know when though. We go to sleep and he wakes me at midnight. Nurse him but he's still awake (which is weird) so I sat on the floor patting and stroking his tummy until he falls asleep. Go back to bed and he doesn't wake me until 4am??? I am missing him so I say do you want to come to bed with mummy he's saying no but I do it anyway (stupid!!!!!!) because then he's sat up awake excited to see daddy excited to see the dog. Won't fall asleep on the boob, won't fall asleep being patted. I go back to his room and he keeps trying to drift off (mostly on his own, again, weird) but then just wakes up again. I try rocking chair, nursing, sitting by his side. He never falls asleep fully. At half 5 I make my husband get up because I'm just getting annoyed at this point and he gets up around then anyway. He takes him to walk the dogs in the pram, still doesn't fall asleep. He's been up for the day since 4am because I took him into our room! Which is all he's ever known! And his horrific sleep went from me honestly being on the verge of a mental breakdown and crappy parenting because I didn't have it in me, to getting a 4 hour stretch. So he was obviously just ready for his own space.

Long rambly post but I just wanted to share that connection DOES breed independence, not like so many people would have you believe. I was happy to keep him in bed with me until he was able to verbally expresss that he wanted his own room if necessary. Neither me or my husband were bothered if it didn't work out and he stayed in our bed longer, and I was really hesitant to even try to be honest. He was never looked after by anybody apart from his parents - but almost always me until I started working 12 hours a week and he started going to daycare in those hours. He has since been looked after by his god mother for max 2 hours a couple of times while he played with their kids. He was ready before me it seems. This is a child that has had contact naps until he was around 1 when I started to leave him on my bed, always nursed to sleep apart from at daycare where he is rocked in arms and has always co slept.