What can we do?

[GenevaJoey]

I have a 5 month old ebf baby, who wakes a lot at night (every hour at the moment) but is generally a good natured child in the day, and naps reasonably well, sleeping after being awake every couple of hours for between 30 mins and 2 hours. I am a sahm. DH is out 7:45 to 6:30 most days, but is currently only working 4 days per week so currently sees her as much as he can.

At the beginning of September when baby was 3 months I booked a French course, 1 evening per week when I'd be out of house 5:30 -9:30. Week after I paid for it baby decided to start refusing bottles of expressed milk which she had eaten before and so Thursday nights have been pretty grim for my husband.

She basically cries for most of the time when he's with her. Tonight she cried herself til she was as sick twice, and then fell asleep. DH tries to feed her milk from cup/bottle/spoon with little success. She has a big meal before I hand her over and eats a lot during the day, so she can't be crying for hunger especially early on. DH baths her, sings, rocks plays and does everything he can think of, and that normally calms her but to no avail.

We're both pretty fed up. Women in Switzerland where I live tend to go back to work at 4 months so it doesn't feel unreasonable to have one evening off a week, but I just don't think we can carry on. Husband is feeling very disheartened and .doesn't know what to do.

I am just exhausted and this evening off really helps my sanity and DH is really keen to have a good relationship with his baby but this is just not working.

What can we do though? How do other mothers leave their children successfully? How can we stop baby being so dependent on me without giving up breastfeeding?

[GenevaJoey]

Just to say, I do breastfeed to sleep half the time, but other times I can leave her in her cot chatting to herself or with white noise and she'll go to sleep on her own. I don't know if that makes a difference.

[Coconut0il]

For us it got easier as DS2 got a bit older. He's always been bf and I still bf him to sleep now at 14 months. The first time I went out of an evening he was probably about 5 months and DP had the same sort of evening as your DH. DS2 has always refused a bottle and he was pretty upset when I got home
As he's got older, ate more food, gone longer between bf, started using a sippy cup, it's been much easier. From about 9 months I could feed him before I went out and he could go 4 hours before another feed. He's never settled in bed for DP but would sleep if he was pushed back and forth in the pushchair then I'd transfer him when I got in.
DS2 is also better if DP takes him out for a bit, normally just to visit family or for a walk.