Over the past two weeks or so, our cat has started meowing a lot more than he used to. He will meow at the back patio door - and at the garage door. He will meow loudly and he varies his vocalization to keep our attention. He does this throughout the day. I work from home, and it is just slightly unprofessional to have a meowing cat in the background.
So how do we stop this behavior?
Things that factor into this:
I am 8 months pregnant - so perhaps he can sense the huge change that is facing us all.
Over the past few weeks we've had a lot of visitors come into the house.
We do on occassion let him out onto the patio - he loves to roll around on the cement, but he never goes off of the patio into the yard. We never let him out unaccompanied and it usually only for a few minutes.
Meowing at the garage is completely new - and recently he ran out into the garage - something we've never let him do and that he's never really shown any interest in.
He also seems distressed when my husband is upstairs and I am upstairs. It's kind of cute - like he wants us all together like one happy family.
I have tried
- spraying him with a water bottle when he's meowing at the garage door. Because we really don't want him getting in there and crawling up into the cars
- ignoring him
- yelling at him
- making loud noises to interrupt the behavior
- encouraging him to come to us and the petting him when he does (but he doesn't always come - sometimes he just keeps meowing)
The problem is I haven't figured out what works bests and I'd really like to get consistent in treating this.
So how do we stop this behavior?
Things that factor into this:
I am 8 months pregnant - so perhaps he can sense the huge change that is facing us all.
Over the past few weeks we've had a lot of visitors come into the house.
We do on occassion let him out onto the patio - he loves to roll around on the cement, but he never goes off of the patio into the yard. We never let him out unaccompanied and it usually only for a few minutes.
Meowing at the garage is completely new - and recently he ran out into the garage - something we've never let him do and that he's never really shown any interest in.
He also seems distressed when my husband is upstairs and I am upstairs. It's kind of cute - like he wants us all together like one happy family.
I have tried
- spraying him with a water bottle when he's meowing at the garage door. Because we really don't want him getting in there and crawling up into the cars
- ignoring him
- yelling at him
- making loud noises to interrupt the behavior
- encouraging him to come to us and the petting him when he does (but he doesn't always come - sometimes he just keeps meowing)
The problem is I haven't figured out what works bests and I'd really like to get consistent in treating this.