I had the same problem with my 5 month old. He would scream, refuse to nurse or be soothed in any way. We would work for hours to get him to sleep, only to have him wake in an hour in order to start the whole process over again. We haven't completely figured it out yet but he is going to sleep very easily now and returning to sleep quicker and with less help. Like you, I don't believe in Cry It Out, although my pediatrician is fine with it. A few things helped us. First, I read The No Cry Sleep Solution by Elizabeth Pantley. I had read both the Dr. Sears Sleep book, which was too liberal, and Healthy Sleep Habits Happy Child, which was too harsh. No Cry Sleep Solution had a bunch of suggestions that fit my parenting style and seemed really doable. I could really see how her suggestions could work, although it does take a while. The first thing that we realized (about two months ago) was that we were putting our son down about an hour later then he needed to. We had set his bedtime at about 7:30, when he seemed tired, when he really needed to go down at 6:00. We start getting him ready and winding him down at about 5:30. We also shortened his bedtime routine from bath, jammies, book, music and sound machine, rock, and finally nurse to sleep to jammies, book, turn on sound machine, nurse, and put down. He falls asleep really quickly now. sometimes he doesn't even make it to 6:00 before falling asleep.
We are now on our second day of our No Cry sleep plan and our son fell asleep for the first time all by himself tonight after four or five brief wakings. Per suggestion of the book I am trying not to pick him up unless he is really upset. Now I just stand by his bed and shhh him quietly until he calms down and falls asleep. At first I was putting my hand on his chest but he seems to calm down quicker if I don't touch him. I also put a t-shirt of mine in his crib. As he was trying to get comfortable he grabbed it and rubbed it on his face. Now, we are only on day two of our first 10 day sleep plan, but I am VERY encouraged. We still haven't figured out the nap thing yet but we are currently getting two or three 30-45 minutes out of him. Better then nothing I suppose. I think that we will have ups and downs before he is finally sleeping through the night, I was SHOCKED at how easily things have been going. I hope that this helps some.