I just wanted to reassure you that you're not alone. And my boy is 8.5! It was a lot worse when he was 4-7years old, peaking between age 6-7...but at the time he slept with us anyway because we lived in a tiny apartment.
I don't know if you already have something like this but when we moved to a larger home, we installed a burglar alarm with the monitoring service. He checks if it's switched on about 5 times a night and stops at about 5 because he knows I'd give him the eye roll. Previously, we managed to allay his fears a little by teaching him how to make booby traps. The traps were actually harmless but being involved in the process of making them gave him some control over his fears.
That's a strong FSIQ score! Congratulations! Are you planning to apply for the YS program?
It will hopefully get better...I'm not sure how much better but at least more manageable when they are older. Age 6-7 was tough on us because he was processing a lot of the information he'd internalized about safety, security, death, diseases etc all at once. He would read all of that at the younger ages and then somehow I think at 6-7 it clicked that it could happen to him too and it got quite intense for a while. This year has been easier. He agrees to sleep in his room about half the time and the other half, we'd find him in our bed in the morning!
Take care and good luck!
