J.J.
hi C.; this is so hard for you and i really, really relate to it. i went thru a period w my older child where he got up 4-6 times during the night too, and i am insistently against crying it out, as you are. i once let my son cry for 10 minutes and he threw up all over himself. that was that.
i have not had any such problems w my daughter who is now 1, my big guy is nearing 3; but my guy just started sleeping thru the night about 6 months ago, having wound down slowly from so many wakeups to 4, 3, 2.... and here we are. he still will get up once every couple of nights. my daughter is still nursing heavily and gets up about 2xs per night.
i want to really commend you for being against CIO because it is a really torturous process that seems to have gained mainstream traction for a variety of wrong-headed reasons. i will really not be surprised if in 3-5 years a study comes out saying CIO is terrible and all the new baby care books will be reinvented. well, i'll be just as glad. the truth is CIO is tantamount to emotional abuse and is downright dangerous. babies can vomit, choke, and even go into respiratory arrest from excessive crying. i don't say this to convince you, you're already ahead of the game; i say this in case anyone pro-CIO is noticing this post. but overall i really applaud your courage for going with your heart and against the norm.
that said, i myself have very little actual, practical advice on 'what to do,' although if you want to try another method you could look at the Dr. Jay Gordon website. he is very pro-co-sleeping, which he calls 'family bed,' which a lot of people have success with. i think it's a great site and reccommend it.
we didn't do that here because we live in a 1 bedroom apartment and are already in the same room anyway. plus my big kid was never interested in sleeping in bed with us and my little one only wants to when she's sick, so we felt that having them in cribs 3 feet away from us was close enough for everyone.
when i was really at my wits end, i just had to sort of cut myself loose emotionally from being engaged with an idea that my child was going to 'sleep well' in the random, imposed terms with which we are all so familiar; in other words, uninterrupted. it just wasn't going to happen. and the longer i held on to a desire or an insistence that it MUST happen, the more anxious and depressed i became. my exhaustion, during the worst of it, was only due in part to my child waking up all night, the rest of it was due to my crying and self jugement and jealousy of moms of 'good sleepers.'
finally one day i said to myself, Self, i said, here's what's good; this baby loves to GO to bed. by 6-630 he was rubbing his eyes and pulling his clothes off to get into the bathtub. he loved his bath, let his little teeth get brushed, and would lay himself down on his changing mat in the quiet, dark bedroom with the ambient noise machine on (i HIGHLY reccommend these, we use it every night), and close his eyes and allow himself to be diaperedd and pajamaed. then he would crawl up into the nursing chair, have a nice nurse with his blankey, and go to sleep; every night, without fail, no matter what.
i leaned on that and started just doing less at night, taking more time to rest in the evening, watch tv w my husband or go for a walk, and started trying to get to bed earlier. when the wakeups happened, i got out of bed, evaluated the kind of wakeup; stick the paci back in, try a backrub, if that failed, get in the nursey chair, give him 5 minutes, he was back asleep, and it was over, and i could go back to sleep too.
so my point is this; i doubt anything works with a frequent waker except to meet the baby's needs. i think that all the systems are basically a bunch of BS that are just set up to help you pass the time between that stage in your child's life where he wakes up a lot into that next stage where he wakes up less; i think you have to resist the humiliating desire to compare your child to someone else's. i think a lot of people who say CIO works are selfish and abusive and frequently lying anyway.
the baby is in love with you. you are god. try putting him in the bed with you; this can be done very safely, check w your local La Leche League chapter or the Dr Gordon website. meet the baby's needs; if he cries nurse him, kiss him, whatever. don't talk, don't turn on the light, don't make a big deal out of it, just show up for the baby. and get back in bed.
it will pass. it really will. if you don't see it improving NEXT YEAR, try the Weisbluth book Healthy Sleep Habits Happy Child.
good luck and hang in there...
jessics