5am Wake Up

solusumbra

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for sometime now (enough to completely making me go crazy) my cat wakes me up at 5am sometimes earlier to eat. I’ve tried ignoring him, closing the door on him, keeping a small bowel of food next to the bed that I can give him and go back to sleep. But it doesn’t seem good enough for him. I really badly need the extra sleep but he just won’t let me. I need ideas fast.

Oh my gosh I just realized I posted about this a couple months ago....
 
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GaryT

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Theodore really likes his string toy and now every morning I find he has dragged it upstairs to the bedroom over-night. I step on it when I am getting up. He wants to play 24/7! So cute!
 

ArtNJ

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I think Gary pretty much nailed it, what else is there to say? Ha, ha, but cute cat Gary. If you misplace your duster, you could use that tail.

Ok, back to the issue. What do you feed when? Asking because the first step should be to determine if this is hunger or boredom.
 

danteshuman

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What about an automatic feeder with an ice pack that feeds him at 4:30 am
Or 5 am? It would take him a few weeks to months to get used to the idea of the feeder and not plan on you feeding him in the morning. Don't give him attention or play with him before your morning coffee, no matter what! It will just make it harder to train him out of his 5 am wake up call.
 
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solusumbra

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He normally gets the canned wet food when I finally get up, until then he just gets the dry. I use to have the dry food available for him downstairs but he wouldn’t eat it until I got up anyways. So I tried feeding him the dry food upstairs aka in my room, and he would eat it and then leave me alone for little while but then start in again.
I would love to get automatic feeders but I can’t afford them.
 

ArtNJ

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Well, one easy thing to try right away is to change the order and give the canned at night rather than dry. Canned food is substantially more filling than dry for the same calories. You might be worried about leaving it out too long, but its actually perfectly safe to leave it out overnight. The browning that occurs from oxidation is no different from the browning of a cut apple that sits out. Its not a safety issue.

Also, stop feeding the cat at 5 am. That is the worst thing you can do, reinforces the behavior.
 
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solusumbra

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I guess I should of mentioned he gets the canned food twice a day morning and night. Dry food in the middle and overnight.
It’s a small amount of each so no he and our other cat are not overweight.
I try to keep some food in his bowel because if there isn’t he gets really mean to the other kitty.
 

ArtNJ

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Its a bit hard for cats to deal with only 2 daily feedings. Can you do 3 feedings, first thing in the am, when home from work, and at night before bed? That and just ignoring the cat at 5 am for a few weeks might do the trick. Ignoring the cat is the most important thing you can do if it is not hunger-motivated.
 
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solusumbra

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ROFL a few weeks I couldn’t do it for more then a few days.
 

susanm9006

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I think you didn’t ignore him long enough. You either lay in bed pretending like you are dead until you are ready to get up or you shut the cat outside the room and don’t waiver, even if he howls every day for months. You aren’t being heartless and your cat isn’t suffering, so don’t feel you need to give in.
 

GaryT

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I think Gary pretty much nailed it, what else is there to say? Ha, ha, but cute cat Gary. If you misplace your duster, you could use that tail.

Ok, back to the issue. What do you feed when? Asking because the first step should be to determine if this is hunger or boredom.
Theo wakes me at about 4:30-5 AM every day. He wants me up so I will comb him, feed him, and play with him. He starts by licking my head, face, and nose. If I don't get up, I get his paw on my head with claws out! That gets me up every time.
 
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solusumbra

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I’ve been down that road as well but instead of claws he (all 16pounds) likes to jump from the window onto my head.
 

lollie

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Koshka gets three wet meals a day, her last at 10pm, so she’s nice and full before bed. I leave a small bowl of dry out at night so she can feed herself breakfast. If he’s keeping you awake, put him out and close your bedroom door. They learn pretty fast.
 

IronHippo

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The Trainable Cat recommends full on ignoring all undesirable behaviors, including early wake up calls. In an NPR interview, she said that means you absolutely can't have any reaction at all when they come in to wake you up for food, because they learn that if one thing doesn't work then something else does and they'll stick to doing that instead. I don't know how I'd feel about getting 16 pounds of cat rained down on my head, so I think you have a more challenging situation, but ignoring has worked for Marple (who is the constantly starving one between our two) in that she doesn't try to force us to look at her anymore, she just sits and lurks until one of us gets up naturally.

She also said that it can take a really long time for them to learn that they aren't going to get a reaction, and if you do react at all then that just reinforces for them that they just have to keep trying and that can prolong the training. But maybe you can block off high points so you don't have to deal with the cat-apult and then go from there?
 

Suru

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Ignore him. I occasionally let my cat in my room when I'm asleep, but mostly he's kept outside. Every once in a while he would meow at my door, usually on weekends when I sleep in later than the weekdays, I ignore him and he's gone after a meow or two. (usually he's just meowing to let me know he's pooped and I should go clean it up :disappointed:)

I house some out-of-state middle schoolers during the school semester. but when the semester ends, they go home and the house is empty. When that happens, I prefer to have my cat in my room at night for bed time company. At first, he often forgets his manners and tries to wake me before I want to wake up, when that happens, he earns an immediate ban from my room. After a couple of days he learns that waking a sleeping human will get him undesired results and leave me alone.

If you normally let your cat where they please around the house, you might get a ton of vocalizing and door scratching at first. but if you ignore that long enough, they learn not to bother with the loud meowing and scratching.

Cats learn fast!
 

epona

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I'd recommend not feeding right away if he has pestered you out of bed - that is reinforcing his behaviour. Go get yourself a coffee, do whatever you do to chill out in the morning. Or pull the covers over your head and ignore him for a bit. Feed him later, so it is not so easily connected by him with a reward for waking you up.

(I am not saying don't feed him, just leave a gap between him trying to wake you up and him getting breakfast, so that him pestering you is not quickly rewarded).
 

susanm9006

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Funny story about bedroom training. All of my cats, seven or eight who have lived with me over the years have learned they aren’t allowed to wake me up if they want to stay in the room. One in particular, my devil Murphy, spent months howling and flailing at the door when she was banned. My routine was to give a warning phrase “settle down” and if that didn’t work, out she went. But she was stubborn and hyperactive and so spent many many nights with loss of bedroom privileges. But she finally figured it out and for many years we both slept peacefully in the bed. But when she reached her late teens she started not being able to sleep and feeling the need for company. And given her advanced age, I did start to accommodate her. But one night when she woke me without thinking I gave her a “settle down!” and this poor old cat dropped to the bed, frozen in place like I had just shot her. Even though I hadn’t used that command in maybe seventeen years, she sure remembered what it meant.
 
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ailish

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I second the "ignore them" advice. The thing is, even after they've learned, you can't ever get up at their command, even if it's time. Ailish, I swear, can tell time. She's learned that we get up at 6. So if she comes to get me at 6 and I let her get me up because, hey, it's what time we get up, the next thing I know she starts to push it. Even when she leaps in bed at 6, I don't get up until she is no longer bothering me. It doesn't take very long once they learn it, but the secret is you can't ever, ever get up when they command or you will need to do a little refresher course in good morning behavior.
 
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