> most people and so-called experts told us to “sleep train” our child

There does seem to be surprisingly large amount of advice which centres on being vaguely unpleasant to your offspring, it always puzzled me.

I actively avoided adopting such ideas, I did everything I could to be kind to them, to pay attention to them and to show them love. For what it's worth my children have turned out, I believe, pretty well and as they've got older it's touching (and almost humourous) to realise that they are increasingly taking the same approach to me !