my 84t is trippin

[DUI]

hey guys, i'm a proud new owner of a 84t 5spd. lol it's fast as hell and i love it. i have a problem and i need some advice. i installed a deck in the z and now my head lights won't pop up, my dash lights don't come on and my tail lights don't work. head lights will shine though. i have checked all fuses and fusible links and no breaks. i'll start from the begining. everything worked on the car except an exhaust leak on the passenger side header and the rear window squirter doesn't.....squirt. i removed the center dash shroud and remove climate control/radio from car and carfully disconnected everything. removed radio from factory cage and installed my aftermarket dash kit. no one in town including my shop had a conversion/smart harness so i tested all of my wires and cucluded the car had common grounds for either side of the vehical. i've done installs on rv's and older cars that had common ground and never had a problem like this. i though i would try to tie both right side and both left side grounds together just to see if it would work without needing diodes. and it did, with out any problems. i went to leave and my head lights came on but didn't pop up. i took everything back out to make sure everything was connected, it was so i cut all my t-joint solders and plugged the stock radio back in and still no luck. are there fusible links under the dash? after scanning my wiring diagrams a found that the "ground" (red/green stripe) i used went to the "lighting switch". i jumped 12v from the connstant to the mystery wire and boom everythinged worked except now i couldn't turn my lights off lol. so i scrapped that though. i've been installing for years so you can imagion how mad/embarresed i am. thank you for any help!