Middle Of The Night Screaming

[zobothehobo]

I need help. I am at my wits end.

I have a cat who I'd like to keep indoor/outdoor. She's been duel like that for most of her life... She's recently come out of a fight with an antibiotic resistant UTI that lasted 6 months... and most of that she was kept inside and with an e-collar on. Now that she's better, she's allowed outside again... The problem is she's far too attached to being outside now!

We've had her on a strict schedule with an 11 PM curfew where she comes inside at 11 PM and is not let out the next day until I get up.

She is having a lot of trouble adjusting to that. She's incredibly unhappy whenever she's in the house and all she does is scream to go back out. It's currently 4 AM and I am exhausted.

I've tried ignoring her, that doesn't work. This has been a week and if I ignore her, she just comes and does it louder and at my ear. Which is worse. I've tried punishing her with a spray bottle (please - spare me the judgement) which also didn't work because she learned the bottle can't get her if she's under the bed! (Which, yes... She'll go under the bed and scream to be let out. She'll be laying down comfortably in my clean clothes in the closet screaming to be let out. It's wild)

She doesn't do cat toys... Like she just straight up doesn't do them. Never has. All I've ever been able to get her to play with is cords and she doesn't like them as much in her old age (she's nearly 9)... So I can't play to tire her out. I've even tried catnip, but she will straight up ignore it in her plight to go outside (this is unusual for her, she's always responded to it strongly). I've tried a meal before bed and she still screams.

I really don't want to let my cat outside all night because I do not feel safe about her outside with no one in the house awake. But I also desperately need sleep.

Anyone have help or suggestions? And please.... if you don't have anything helpful to say, do not say it at all. Which means if you're going to judge me for trying a spray bottle, just don't. If you're going to say "you need to figure out why she's meowing," just don't. If you're going to say "maybe you just haven't found the right toy to tire her out," just don't. I apologize for the frankness of this, I'm tired. I've barely slept in the past month. She just won't stop screaming.

 

[Kieka]

I have been in you exact same spot. And when I say exact I mean exact.

I have indoor/outdoor cats and after Link broke his leg we started keep them in from dusk until dawn. Our cat door is smart so it auto locks and unlocks each day to enforce the curfew. Link is part Siamese and got all the loud mouth aspect. In the beginning he would cry non-stop for hours. Best advice, ignore her in every way. We found that if we go to sleep (or at least lay down) and don't acknowledge him he stops and sleeps too. Second best advice, a cat tree or shelf near windows. Link LOVES his cat tree next to a window and staring outside. When he is particularly antsy if I can get him to go to it he will settle and sometimes even fall asleep.

Good luck. Here is Link enjoying the view.

 

[Kieka]

Add on.... the auto cat door is totally worth it. In the morning he fixates on that instead of waking me.

 

[abyeb]

Has she been spayed? Whole cats will yowl to attract a mate.

 

[zobothehobo]

Has she been spayed? Whole cats will yowl to attract a mate.

Yes, she's been spayed.

 

[zobothehobo]

I have been in you exact same spot. And when I say exact I mean exact.

I have indoor/outdoor cats and after Link broke his leg we started keep them in from dusk until dawn. Our cat door is smart so it auto locks and unlocks each day to enforce the curfew. Link is part Siamese and got all the loud mouth aspect. In the beginning he would cry non-stop for hours. Best advice, ignore her in every way. We found that if we go to sleep (or at least lay down) and don't acknowledge him he stops and sleeps too. Second best advice, a cat tree or shelf near windows. Link LOVES his cat tree next to a window and staring outside. When he is particularly antsy if I can get him to go to it he will settle and sometimes even fall asleep.

This is actually what I feared. I'm just going to have to wait this out.
It's not just hard because you wanna sleep... it's hard because I hear her being miserable and I know how to make her happy but I also know that that's like not an option that I'd like to do.

I just kind of want her to be happy inside the house again. Because I just woke up and she heard me typing and she's resumed yelling. It's like she hates this place and I fees terrible.

 

[maggiedemi]

Boy, do I understand what you're going through. We let my male cat live outside most of the first year of his life. But then I saw a coyote in the backyard one day. I freaked out and decided to make him an indoor cat. He cried for two weeks straight, all day and night! He's fine now. He's starting to understand that night time is for sleeping.

 

[zobothehobo]

The worst part of this y'all is that I've been through this before and this feels different.

I got this cat when I was in high school and still living at home. She lived with me at my dad's from 2009-2013. Over there, there was a cat door she could go in and out of freely and the neighborhood was big enough and had enough cats out that we all felt okay letting the cats (we had 2) come and go freely.

In 2013, I moved out of my parents' house to an apartment and I had to keep in her indoors. She was an indoor cat from 2013-2017. She screamed initially, but I set up a giant old broken cord that hung from the ceiling for her to play with and she was fine. She adjusted pretty well after that and was a good indoor kitty. Her screaming then was limited to 5AM-7AM, when she used to get up at my dad's. And when I gave her something to do, she was fine.

Now it feels different. In January of this year, I moved into a house. I ordered tags and collars for both of my cats and I was so excited to let them out. Stacey could tell that this was a house, not an apartment, and that she was going to be allowed outside. She started crying then but once I got the collar and tags and I let her out, she was happily an indoor/outdoor sweetheart. For a few days she wasn't sure what was happening at night, but she got used to it in a few days.

Then her UTI got real bad and I took her to the vet and we went on that hell for a few months. It got worst when she was in an e-collar for two weeks. She screamed All. The. Time. If I wasn't petting her, she was screaming. I made allowances... I'm sure the e-collar sucked. I hoped it would get better when it came off and she was allowed back outside. But it's not.

It really feels like she hates this house. Not me - her favorite thing to do is to sit on the back porch with me. The other day I went out there to play guitar in the acoustics of nature and she came running to me when she heard me sing. She'll literally come running when I call her just because she loves to be near me. I don't feel like she hates me, and I'm thankful. But I feel like she hates this house. She's happiest on the back porch.

I don't know... it just feels like this house is her prison, not her home and I don't know what to do about it.

 

[di and bob]

She doesn't hate the house, she hates change, just as all cats do. It will take up to a year for her to be comfortable with the new house. She has learned her screaming brings results, so she does it longer and longer as she knows that sooner or later she will get attention, even bad attention is attention. Since she screams all the time anyway, lock her out of your room, or keep her in a special room at night. Eventually you can start letting her back in, but IMMEDIATELY put her outside the shut door if she starts screaming, EVERY TIME. I know this sounds like a pain, but it is the only way for her to associate her screaming with being locked out. If you let her stay in the room after even one scream, you'll have to start all over again. I put two of my cats in a heated shop, with heated beds of course, at night to get some sleep, they are the noisy ones at night. Now, 6 months later, just when I was going to start letting them stay out all night like they used to because it is warm now, (they were strays and outside cats) they run to the shop meowing and wanting in at sunset, they actually want in, and you would think I was beating them at first the way they acted. I always give them some treats when I let them in, that may help too, treats when you get the results you want. Consistency is what keeps a cat happy, even if they hate it at first. I hope I gave you some ideas, I know they have worked for me. She loves you, but she is manipulating you, and like a parent, YOU have to be the one who makes the rules, and enforce them, whether punishment or rewards. Good luck!

 

[zobothehobo]

She doesn't hate the house, she hates change, just as all cats do. It will take up to a year for her to be comfortable with the new house. She has learned her screaming brings results, so she does it longer and longer as she knows that sooner or later she will get attention, even bad attention is attention. Since she screams all the time anyway, lock her out of your room, or keep her in a special room at night. Eventually you can start letting her back in, but IMMEDIATELY put her outside the shut door if she starts screaming, EVERY TIME. I know this sounds like a pain, but it is the only way for her to associate her screaming with being locked out. If you let her stay in the room after even one scream, you'll have to start all over again. I put two of my cats in a heated shop, with heated beds of course, at night to get some sleep, they are the noisy ones at night. Now, 6 months later, just when I was going to start letting them stay out all night like they used to because it is warm now, (they were strays and outside cats) they run to the shop meowing and wanting in at sunset, they actually want in, and you would think I was beating them at first the way they acted. I always give them some treats when I let them in, that may help too, treats when you get the results you want. Consistency is what keeps a cat happy, even if they hate it at first. I hope I gave you some ideas, I know they have worked for me. She loves you, but she is manipulating you, and like a parent, YOU have to be the one who makes the rules, and enforce them, whether punishment or rewards. Good luck!

That's an idea I toyed with but haven't tried because of how much of a pain it is.

Why do you think she initially adjusted to the change of coming in at night and now is upset with it? Because something changed in the time she had the e-collar on. She was okay being inside at night, happy even, would curl up and sleep at my head. Now she's miserable and upset. Screams and sleeps under the bed... like she doesn't feel safe.

 

[sargon]

With the possible exceptions of biting and litter box issues, cats waking you up has to be the worst behavioral issue and it wears on a person.

As others have said, kicking her out of your bedroom for screaming may work. My cat sometimes likes to wake me, and I kick her out, which tends to chasten her and stop the behavior for a time.

On a more extreme end, it may be that your cat will no longer tolerate a curfew, and you may have to let that go, either by no longer enforcing it, or by returning her to indoor only status (I like my method for doing that, where you only let the cat out in horrible weather... ), since she seemed to do alright indoors only in the past.

 

[di and bob]

I have never used an E-collar on any of my 50+ cats I have had in my lifetime, I think it is harder on them then anything done to them at the vets. I have NEVER had a complication from them not wearing one. I truly think she remembers the collar and it is still making her miserable. Like I said, it takes months and months sometimes for cats to get over some events. There were too many changes for her to handle at one time, she IS miserable. She needs reassurance, love and attention, and most of all consistency in her life right now. She may feel that she is safer outside at night and wants out. She may understand that her waking you makes you mad, (I know I would be screaming) and hides under the bed, but she can't help herself. Have you had her retested to make sure she doesn't have the UTI back? Or is she OK outside, or during the day? I'm sorry but she has learned that screaming brings your attention, now she has to be taught that quiet makes you happy. You might try giving her one or two treats and praising her when she is quiet, and completely ignoring her when she is noisy.

 

[zobothehobo]

I have never used an E-collar on any of my 50+ cats I have had in my lifetime, I think it is harder on them then anything done to them at the vets. I have NEVER had a complication from them not wearing one. I truly think she remembers the collar and it is still making her miserable. Like I said, it takes months and months sometimes for cats to get over some events. There were too many changes for her to handle at one time, she IS miserable. She needs reassurance, love and attention, and most of all consistency in her life right now. She may feel that she is safer outside at night and wants out. She may understand that her waking you makes you mad, (I know I would be screaming) and hides under the bed, but she can't help herself. Have you had her retested to make sure she doesn't have the UTI back? Or is she OK outside, or during the day? I'm sorry but she has learned that screaming brings your attention, now she has to be taught that quiet makes you happy. You might try giving her one or two treats and praising her when she is quiet, and completely ignoring her when she is noisy.

The e-collar was necessary. She was obsessively grooming the area and irritating it so it couldn't heal. I tried to let her heal without it and it didn't work (we did 4 courses of antibiotics. 3 different and the last one was the same as the first one but with an e-collar on). I have had her retested and she's infection free!

And yeah, she's okay outside during the day. She's completely fine. As soon as the door opens, she'll just go sit on the porch. Sometimes she'll go over to my neighbor's house and roll in their dirt, but she always ends up on my back porch. And she's herself out there. Kind, loving, affectionate. She's content. And then when she comes inside (even during the day), she's miserable and wants to go back out.

 

[maggiedemi]

I agree with di and bob. You have to show her that you are in charge, you make the rules. My cat screamed for two weeks straight, but he eventually learned that I'm the boss of him, he stays indoors, and he lets us sleep at night. It sounds mean, but rules are good for them, just like with children.

 

[di and bob]

She's associating being inside with misery (that E-collar) and you being upset with her screaming at night. I wonder if you could put up a big covered dog kennel for her at night to stay outside? Or even a smaller one, just for nights. It sounds like that is what she wants. That way you can keep her there when you are gone or at night to get some sleep. Give her a treat every time she goes in. If she had a nice comfy small house and water she might enjoy it. It will take time though for her to realize that if she wants to be outside at night and while you are gone she will have to kennel up. (like mine 'shop up' )
Eventually you can entice her inside the house with love and treats and let her out immediately when she gets upset, she will eventually forget why she was upset. Maybe start feeding her just inside the door to give her good vibes. You might want to review how to get a feral to stay inside on one of those forums, they have a lot of tried and true ideas.

 

[zobothehobo]

She's associating being inside with misery (that E-collar) and you being upset with her screaming at night. I wonder if you could put up a big covered dog kennel for her at night to stay outside? Or even a smaller one, just for nights. It sounds like that is what she wants. That way you can keep her there when you are gone or at night to get some sleep. Give her a treat every time she goes in. If she had a nice comfy small house and water she might enjoy it. It will take time though for her to realize that if she wants to be outside at night and while you are gone she will have to kennel up. (like mine 'shop up' )
Eventually you can entice her inside the house with love and treats and let her out immediately when she gets upset, she will eventually forget why she was upset. Maybe start feeding her just inside the door to give her good vibes. You might want to review how to get a feral to stay inside on one of those forums, they have a lot of tried and true ideas.

I wish I had the money for a dog kennel like that... That sounds like she might really like it!

I'm hoping maybe a treat when she comes in and then lots of love when she's not screaming? To recondition her to the house being a place of love and comfort?

 

[Kieka]

You can find the large dog kennels on sites like Craigslist for under $40 or at estate sales.

 

[di and bob]

It's a start to recondition her with treats. I was going to mention those buy and sale spots on the radio. They are free and you could advertise for a kennel. Many people have them sitting empty and would love to get rid of them.