Okay, I have now signed on to this forum in hopes if getting some answers to my cats whining. My fiance and I have 2 cats. They get along great and are best friends. The one cat, Elvis, is making us crazy though. About 2 months ago he started this thing where every morning at about 5am he will climb onto our windowsill and whine. He wakes us up with his whining and won't stop. One of us always ends up getting up and locking him out of the bedroom so we can get back to sleep. We have tried everything to get him to stop this. We always fill their food bowls before bed so there is still plenty of food available for them. I will admit that Elvis is slightly spoiled so I am wondering if he is doing it for attention, but it's 5am!!!!! We always snuggle with them at night so we don't want to have to shut them out of the bedroom every night when we go to bed, but we're getting really fed up being woken up every morning at 5am. Any suggestions?
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Please let me sleep...
- Thread starter philsfan79
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Is he neutered? I remember back when my family first adopted my cat, he would sit on the arm of the couch early every morning and howl. After he was neutered, he stopped doing that.
Does he perhaps see another cat that he wants to interact with outside the window? Exactly how old is Elvis and yes...is he neutered?
Katie
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Yes both our cats are neutered. I have been around a cat in heat before and will never let that happen again. Ugh!!
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He is neutered and about 1 year old. I have thought about that scenario, but sometimes he faces away from the window while crying. Also, when we get up to put him outside of the bedroom we will look and not see anything outside. It's making us crazy!!!
I have not had this problem too much with my cats, but here's what I read about excessive night-time vocalization on another board:
http://www.sniksnak.com/cathealth/nocturnal.html
http://www.sniksnak.com/cathealth/nocturnal.html
Has he ever been outside, even if possibly in escape? Maybe he's asking for a trip outdoors. Once a cat gets a taste for it, they always want it.
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I had a roommate in college whose cat started doing that. Well it started because she started experiencing her first heat (and got spayed right away). But that didn't fix the 5 am crying.
The vet placed the cat on valume 3 times a day. It really didn't help though. In the end, it turned into a phase that lasted a year. After we had moved out she reported back to me that her cat had finally stopped the 5 am wake up calls.
The vet placed the cat on valume 3 times a day. It really didn't help though. In the end, it turned into a phase that lasted a year. After we had moved out she reported back to me that her cat had finally stopped the 5 am wake up calls.
I work shifts, and my sleep patterns are of course completely bonkers. When anything furry disrupts that, it gets smacked with a pillow. It's not intentional on my part, as I'm half asleep and would normally never strike an animal but it's effective.
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Our Max was about one and a half yrs. old when we got him from another family. He had been strictly an indoor cat there too. Anyway, at 5 am he would jump on the bed and jump off and that would never stop until seven which was our time to get up. The folks who had him told me the reason was they had to get up at five to get ready for work. Max was already used to five am wake up time and we never did break him of it.
Our 2 "boys" sleep on their bunk beds in the bath-laundry room. They have food and water next to their beds and their litter is in a closet in the same room.
Sure takes care of that middle of the night yowling problem.....and they are sooo cute sleeping in thier little beds.
Sure takes care of that middle of the night yowling problem.....and they are sooo cute sleeping in thier little beds.
My cat, Molly, has gone through phases where she does this, too. I call them her 4 am "anxiety attacks." I've tried everything from food to picking her up and cuddling her a bit but she seems to want a lot more active attention than this and I just want to go back to sleep...yawn. In the interest of my health, I finally decided to be a meanie and spray her with water when she went through her 4 am yowling exercises. I put the spray bottle on my bed side. I always felt bad about doing it but this usually seemed to work.
Good luck.
Well, I just read the Cat Forum's article on active play before bed. Actually, I normally do that anyway but I'll make a point to do more of it when I notice that Molly starts in on her 4 am yowling routine.
Once you start giving into them at 5AM, they will continue the behavior. Many of mine have done that over the years. One used to come up to me at 4AM sharp and start licking the inside of my nose (rude awakening). We turn over, put the covers over our heads and ignore them. They will figure out that you aren't going to respond to them and will quit it after a while.
The thing that really helped us the most is when we put a 6 foot tall scratch post outside our bedroom door. They love that tree and jump on it and wait for the 6AM alarm to ring.
The thing that really helped us the most is when we put a 6 foot tall scratch post outside our bedroom door. They love that tree and jump on it and wait for the 6AM alarm to ring.
