Expert: Kate Tilmouth - 2/1/2009

Question
Hi
I have a 6 year old cat. He has always had a problem with his weight, but we seem to have gotten it under control recently with Origen Cat food. He is a relatively large cat. He is usually pretty demanding when it comes to meal time. He gets 1/4 cup of food 2x a day. Normally around 6am just before we get up he starts bothering us for food by meowing, and lightly biting our hands etc, which is irritating, but usually can sleep though it for a while. Recently he has started just sitting outside the bedroom door (the door is open, and he can come and go as he pleases) and will scratch non stop until one of us gets up to do something about it. At first it started at the normal 6am wake up time, but now has been getting increasingly earlier. There is no way for us to ignore this behavior, and I realize that getting up to feed him is only re-enforcing this behavior, but what else can we do. He will not stop until we give him something. I am so frustrated. When he does that then obviously he is hungry for his dinner earlier than normal meaning that he is constantly under our feet. We typically make him wait for his dinner until about 6pm. What can we do???

Thanks for any advice you might have.

Answer
Hi
I know this behaviour is very difficult to handle as i too have a rather demanding cat like this.

The thing is it is not always to do with hunger.  a lot of the time it is down to boredom and habit. I.e cats are more active during the night naturally and they find it difficult to understand why we are in bed when they want your attention. Also as cats get older their sleeping patterns can change and this means that it falls out of sync with us. this is normal.

However the big problem is this, as you say if you get up and see to him then you are re enforcing the behaviour and it can become harder and harder to break. Unfortunately it is one of those times that you have to be tough to be kind to break the habit. Or like my partner who has decided that he will sacrifice his sleep for the cat (his choice)

So the only thing you can do is, to play a game with him about half an hour before bed time, something that will tire him out a little (this will take persistence and practice if he is a cat that is not used to playing like this, but it will also help with his weight as a lot of cat weight problems is down to lack of exercise and not food), then just before bedtime feed him . then you will have to keep him in another room with his toys and bed etc and close the door so that he cannot get to you. you should also close your door so that you won't hear him. Sounds hard doesn't it, i know but it is only a habit that you are trying to break and hopefully given time he will realise that he doesn't get the attention and will stop the behaviour and will fall into the new routine.

Tough I know but there really isn't much else you can do, cats can be pretty persistent as you know.

best wishes Kate
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