Alone again naturally

Dakota was taken from his biological mother when he was around 2; then he lived with a foster family until he came to live with us. While with his- I'll call her bio-mom (though that sounds like the $6 Million Dollar Man or hazardous waste)- he was left alone a lot. She wouldn't take him out of his crib except to feed him for his first 6 months; his first 3 months he was on his back in his crib so much that there was an indention in his head that took a long time to go away. After this great beginning he lived in a car for a while. Naturally he did not develop physically, neurologically or socially. One of many consequences of that is Dakota does not like to be alone. For the first three years we had him it was like living with Elvis (the later Elvis when he started taking drugs and Little Debbie snack cakes): if he was awake, everybody was going to be awake; if he was in a room, everybody needed to be in the same room. He is able to spend short periods by himself now but he doesn't like it much. Bed time continues to be a difficult time though not as traumatic for him- but still frustrating for us. He does not like to sleep because that means he will be alone so though we start the going to bed process at 8:30, he is still awake at 10:00 calling down to see if we're awake or ask "Can I tell you something" questions. Every night its the same fight to put him to bed, read a story, lay with him a minute then leave him there knowing in a few minutes he'll be up saying he's scared or can't sleep. And when he does fall asleep, somewhere in the night he is downstairs coming in to sleep with us, which means someone is off to the couch or to sleep in his bed instead of him. I haven't had a full night's sleep in my own bed in years...of course he sleeps like a baby! We try to remind ourselves why he does this and we take turns with the night time ritual but it can be very tiring- well for everybody but him apparently. The concept of "alone time" is lost on Dakota- I guess he had enough of that.