Reasons?
For me it wasn't really a conscious 'choice', it's something my family has always done. My sister and I co-slept with our parents and they did the same with their parents. I was really surprised when I found out co-sleeping was considered a rather 'crunchy' concept, to me it was normal and I thought everyone did it. It wasn't something DH had grown up but once I explained it to him he decided it made perfect sense and was quite happy with the idea.

Co sleeping doesn't necessarily mean sharing a bed, it can just be sharing a room as well. We do a bit of both. DS has slept in our room from day 1, first in a bassinette and now a cot, this is where he has day naps and goes down to sleep at night. If he wakes up during the night (which is at least twice a night) he comes into our bed. For us it's convenient, we don't have to keep going to another room to check on him during the night (I still get paranoid and check he's breathing several times a night) and if he cries it's just a case of popping him in the bed and feeding. I couldn't think of anything more tiring than having to keep going to another room to settle him. Having a baby is bloody hard work, so if there is anything that can make my life easier then I'll be doing it, co-sleeping means both DS and I get more, less broken sleep.

How long?
We haven't put a timeline on this, as long as we need to I guess. When DS outgrows the cot we'll probably just put a little mattress on our bedroom floor for him until he's ready for his own room. My sister co-slept until she was 6, she's now a very independent young woman.

More babies?
We don't want another for a least 4 years so hopefully this will not be an issue but if we needed to we could make it work and start off with the same arrangement we have now (cot in our room). Lots of people do it. Lucky we have a king size bed!

I personally don't see the fascination with trying to make babies 'independent' from day one, they are so reliant on us for everything at first it doesn't make sense to try and push that away, it's my way of showing him I love him. I am never concerned all of this will make DS clingy and always reliant on me, quite the opposite actually.