Getting up early

My kitten has been waking up at 5 a.m lately. We bought him a few weeks ago and for a while he was waking up fine, but now he wakes up at 5 a.m and starts running around and playing and making noise trying to get us to play with him when we're asleep . Is this behavior normal and if not what can I do to stop it?

yes, its normal! i am surprised it just now started. both of ours did the same thing, all night, and really, they still do. but they would sleep all day and then stay up all night and run around making trouble. there is nothing you can do to change it... he is just being a kitten

you can try closing them out of your room at night and let him run around the house as he pleases.

This is normal and it will probably continue until your kitten is older. If it's disturbing your sleep, you can try closing the bedroom door. The thing you don't want to do is to respond, thinking if you give in it will make him stop. It won't. It'll just encourage him to continue.

He sleeps in our room for now because we got our carpetting re-done and we put his cat-condo and bed and litter and food in our room, soon he'll be sleeping in the living room or office and we'll move all his stuff there, but for now i guess we'll have to live with it.

this made me chuckle because i remember first getting my old cat Teeka. When we first got her, she was used to getting up early with her old owner, and would wake us up at 7 am. We both worked nights, and didn't get up until at least 10 am. Pretty soon she got used to our pattern. She would sleep until 10 to 10:30 am and then wake us up.

one day i had to get up at 6 am or some ungodly hour. I was creeping around the house and she was in her bed. i said hi to her and talked to her, and i will never forget - she looked at me like i was crazy for getting up so early, and promptly went back to sleep!

That's a really good illustration of how cats adapt to our schedules.

That is SO normal. Marcellus used to wake me up at that time but now, all 3 of my kitties wait patiently until I get up. As soon as my feet hit the floor though they know it's time to eat and get on with the day. As long as you don't reward their early rising...playing, eating immediately, those sorts of things, things will settle down as your kitten matures. I would just ignore my cats totally when they did the early rising thing. It takes time but it was worth it. When Marcellus would wake me....with biting....I would cover my head with a sheet, totally ignoring him and in time, that really worked. I would say, if possible, don't give him any attention until you are ready to get up. Be patient though as it will take some time. Do you just have one kitten/cat? Another kitten would help a lot...someone to play with.

It takes a few weeks or even longer but almost all cats will adapt to your schedule. Make sure you tire him out thoroughly before bedtime, then give him a snack to help him sleep heavily. And as said, don't give in. Good luck.

As said above, this is normal behavior. However, you can train your cat to sleep at night and run about during the day.... this is what I have done with Guinness and 95% of the time it has worked!

When he was small if he scratched on the bedroom door or ran about the hallway like a looney I would ignore him. When he got older he was allowed outside (he is an inside/outside cat) but I never let him stay out during the night. He has got into the routine of coming in at 9pm ish, eating his dinner then going to bed (either his bed or my bed haha).

Last night is a typical example. I was up late, at about 10.30 I called him and he come running in via his cat flap, ate his dinner and by the time I had brushed my teeth he had decided to curl up in his bed. I wake at 6am most days so around this time, just before my alarm he normally lets out a little meeeooow that it's time for mummy to wake up and feed him! hehe

Just think of your cat as the back up alarm system!!

Cats are by nature nocturnal (think of the fact that their food, mostly rodents, is nocturnal, and it makes sense). In the wild, they maintain this behavior, but in captivity, they tend to adjust to their owner's cycle of sleeping. It takes them about a year to adjust, though, so you're in for a bit of fun. My best suggestion is to have kitten sleep somewhere that isn't in the same space as your sleeping self until they're older and have discovered the wonderful sleep they can accomplish on your bed during the night.

So............ somebody has to adjust huh ?

I say get a night job

Works for me, my nocturnal kitties and hermit crabs. We got it all worked out.

Yes it's normal, but there isn't much you can do to stop it. Kitten will grow out of it. Limerick would wake me up at 5 then at 6 then at 7 everyday. Now he just lets me sleep.

That's why none of my cats sleep in my bedroom. Only when it's kitten season do I have cats in my room and then they wake me up at all hours of the morning, but I don't mind.