advice needed, please!

i am tired.  i often feel like i should not be tired because i go to bed by 10 or 11 and get up usually around 7.  eight to nine hours of sleep should do it, right???  well, it's funny because i'm not really getting 9 hours of sleep.  oakley wakes up almost every night (sometimes every other) crying.  last night, i lost count how many times i had to get up and soothe him. 

when we first moved in, i thought it was the transition that was waking him.  moving to a new house (again) and now sleeping in a twin bed.  well, it stopped for like a week, but he's been doing it for about a month now.  he has been telling me about some nightmares that he has, and sometimes will wake up uncontrollably shaking like crazy and crying because he's so scared.  it breaks my heart to think that things could scare him so badly.  i don't think it's night terrors because he's completely coherent.  and he doesn't wake at the same time every night.  last night he woke up every hour for like 4 hours...what's the deal?  we are wondering if it's a habit, having me come into his room, but how do you break that habit?  i feel so guilty not going in there when he is sincerely freaking out from a nightmare.

i'm looking for any advice.  maybe you have had this challenge with a child.  how did you handle it?  i'm so tired of feeling tired all the time.  i'm sure it's effecting oakley, too, because he's up every time i am up.  any suggestions?

by the way, he has a night light and stuffed animals to "protect" him.  and he tells us where to search his room before bed.  sad, isn't it??  he seems so young to think scary things are in his room.  i am at a loss. 

thanks in advance.