Cat Keeping Me Awake At Night

hofheimerx

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My cat has started doing incredibly infuriating things at night while I'm trying to sleep. On occasion, he would come to my closed door and whine and or scratch at it but eventually give up and go away. But recently he has picked up a new habit that he does relentlessly and practically every night. He has somehow found a way to open my door, even when it is locked. I'm not sure if there is something wrong with the door, but my cat has found a way to open it and I'm quite certain he can't even reach the door knob. We have tried locking the door and trying to open it from the outside but have had no luck in finding a malfunction with the door, so we have no idea how my cat is opening it. 

Because my door is quite loud when opened, every time my cat opens my door it wakes me. I am finding it impossible to sleep through the night peacefully with my cat opening my door five to ten times a night. And there doesn't seem to be any way to deter him from doing this. If I get out of bed and scare him away, he comes right back and opens my door again. 

I don't know what to do, but I'm barely getting any sleep at all. 
 

talkingpeanut

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Two ideas -

Do you play with your cat actively before you go to bed? He should be getting an outlet for his energy by running around until he is exhausted every night before you want to sleep. Wand toys are great for this. I gather that he's bored at night and making you wake up and scare him away is registering as some attention. Ignoring him would really be best, even though I'm sure that's hard. As is, you're giving him attention, which is what he wants.

Second, could you make your door more quiet? Maybe add some oil to the hinges? Or add some fabric to the handle of it's banging into the wall? Might help while you're breaking him of the habit.
 
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hofheimerx

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He gets plenty of play time before bed, I can assure you. We recently got a new puppy and they play together (until the point of exhaustion) very frequently. We thought at first that this new behavior may be his way of saying he wants attention as he gets less of it from us now that we have two pets. But he seems to enjoy playing with the puppy, although it does get a bit rough at times. 
 
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hofheimerx

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Anywhere from two to three years old, most likely closer to two. He was a stray when we got him so we can't be 100% sure.
 

rickr

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I'm not sure how helpful this will be, but here goes....As a youngster, Lucy was a typical teenager; she slept all day and partied all night.  We tried all of the usual remedies: vigorous play before bed, timeouts, waking her during the day when I noticed her sleeping, and on and on.  Nothing worked.  She has a will of iron.

But as she grew older (she's 5+ now) her sleep patterns normalized; now she mostly sleeps thru the night.  She wakes up about 4am and then climbs a perch in front of a window, where she quietly waits for Archie and me to wake up.  

One other idea.  You didn't mention why you keep the door closed.  Closed rooms often serve as cat magnets; they are compelled to explore anything that's off limits. You might try keeping the door open and allowing your cat to come and go into the room.  Once the novelty wears off, he might quiet down. 

If none of the suggested remedies above help, you may need to give him time to outgrow the behavior.  I wish you the best of luck.  I know it's a difficult situation. 
 

peagreenboat82

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It's sounds like you've already made other attempts to ease the situation like play before bed. It's not ideal, but at least until you figure out what is wrong with the door, you could try motion sensor compressed air. I have asthma and am fine as long as I don't sleep with the cats all night so I can't have my cats in the bedroom at all. It has to be maintained as a cat free space. This irks one of my cats, and he'll slip his big paw under the space below the door and shake it loudly. We got the idea for the compressed air from one of the Jackson Galaxy My Cat From Hell episodes. My cat now mostly leaves the door alone. I wouldn't recommend using it for just any old problem, but if you're desperate, here's what we use:

 
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