Need advice - constant meowing at night

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Megan and Boots (GA)

Megan and Boots (GA)

Member Since 2015
Here's the situation: Boots has spent the past several months meowing A LOT at night in the bedroom. Thankfully, I'm a heavy sleeper and he wakes me only once or maybe twice a night, but he wakes my light-sleeping partner up all the time to the point that he's really sleep deprived and falling asleep at work. We're just about at our wits' end.

It all started just prior to Boots' diabetes diagnosis. He'd come in the middle of the night to cry, presumably for food (he'd settle down if fed). Once he was diagnosed, we felt bad for the night crying, assuming he genuinely felt like his body was starving, so we started catering to his cries even more and getting up and feeding him sometimes 2-3 times a night. Well now his blood sugars have been well regulated for well over a month, and other symptoms of the diabetes are diminishing (excessive thirst/peeing for starters), but his cries at night are if anything worse! I suspect it's because it's turned into more of a behavioral problem - he is used to crying and getting a snack, so he does it because it works?

We tried doing an auto-feeder overnight but I guess those 3-4 snacks weren't enough, because he continued to come in and cry.

"Shut the door" - you might say. Well, we have two reasons for hesitation:
1) we have two other kitties who come and go at night, often sleep with us, and cause no problems (actually when we DO shut the door, one of those two tends to get upset being shut out and scratches at the door);
2) the last time or two we did that, Boots got so upset and worked himself up so badly that he peed in our guest bedroom next door and our upstairs bathroom. (Now, that was back when the diabetes was a little less controlled, so maybe it was also related to that and it wouldn't happen now that his blood sugar is in check, but you can understand our hesitation to shut the door)

We tried Feliway spray - no luck calming him down with that.

Does anyone have any ideas? Should we just shut the door and hope for the best (no accidents)? Some other non-Feliway calming spray maybe? Anti-anxiety meds (trying to avoid that, but getting desperate)? We don't want to just feed him more throughout the day because I really think it's behavioral not starvation and he's actually been gaining weight recently on his current 6-7oz canned food daily diet.

We're desperate! I hope someone else has been through a similar situation and has some advice for something that might work! Thanks in advance...
 
I noticed that Boots got radio-iodine for HT a few years prior to the diabetes Dx. Squeaker did too.

Squeaker also began squalling a lot at night. I had noticed during this period that his thyroid panels were up and down. Low, normal, low normal. I had a thyroid panels run a couple of times but that checked out ok. When I took him for a check up with the IM----he looked at all the results and said he thought it was Euthyroid sickness. The thyroid secretes hormones normally but the body doesn't retain them. Squeaker was but on Levo-T to stimulate production of hormones so there was more flooding into his system; his system had more available to retain. Since that time the night time yowling has ceased.

I would begin to watch the result of T-4, Free T4 on test results when you have testing. You might notice a trend like I saw. It is certainly an option.

Have you tried a pheromone collar? It might help more than the spray as it is a constant presence right under the nose.
 
Try 15-20 minutes of active play in the morning and early evening. This may help reduce stress and tire him out so he bothers you less.
And do check with the vet. There is a condition called cognitive dysfunction syndrome which may happen in older cats and sometime meds may help. Some cats may find a night light helps them stay oriented.
 
Until you get it sorted, would he wear these? I'm sorry to say I snore like a tractor at night and my partner says these help a ton. Very comfy! And $4 at SprawlMart!!

Screen Shot 2015-08-13 at 10.22.37 PM.png
 
When max was unregulated, he meowed a lot during the night. At the time he was drinking from toilets and whatnot, so I think he was uncomfortable or thirsty. This improved with regulation, so I'm not sure it's related to your issue.

My other cat, a female, is older and "hunts" at night. There are specific low pitched howls that cats will do while hunting. Older female cats seem to do it the most, but I suppose any cat can get in the mood. If you notice toys moved around at night, this may be your issue. I'm not really sure what to do about it with my cat other than to accept the "food" and thank her. This is kinda what jane sounds like:
 
Thanks, everyone.
@BJM we were actually thinking of trying that, since he often naps a decent bit between 8pm and our bedtime - maybe if we kept him up and tried to get him a little more active in the evening, he'd be quieter overnight.
@Anitafrnhamer will have to check that out. I think his last couple bloodwork checks have shown his T4 has been good, on the low side of normal but still normal (1.0 was his last reading at the same time he was diagnosed with diabetes in May - no bloodwork since then though).
@Meya14 I don't think it's being unregulated, because it's actually been getting a little worse if anything now that he's well regulated. And I don't think he's a hunter; he couldn't seem to care less about toys and stuff in his older age! That's interesting though that some cats do that at night, we have a 10 year old female too who moves stuff around all the time at night, mostly this plastic hawaiian lei leftover from a party years ago that she carries around all the time.
@Brashworks That might be his only hope for sleep at this point!!

I think we're going to try to get him up and moving a bit more before our bedtime, though that's increasingly hard to do - he just doesn't have the drive to play anymore like he did. I really have a hunch it's more trained behavioral than hunger because once in a while on a busy Saturday for us, we'll be in and out of the house and he'll be chilling peacefully, and we sometimes will go from 8am til 5pm or so without feeding him and he doesn't make a peep. I think over the past couple months as we catered to his diabetes-induced hunger cries at night, he learned real quick that if he cries, someone will probably get up to feed him. I think it might be time for some tough love, to just ignore the middle of the night cries, maybe work in a single 3am automatic feeder meal at some point. Pre-diagnosis, he went from 11pm til 8am with no food just fine though, so I'm hoping with re-training he'll learn that his nighttime cries won't get him fed? Of course, there may be little sleep for us humans during that period... :coffee:
 
I know I've posted this on other threads- so sorry if you've already read about these, but before you try prescription anti-anxiety (with which we had big side effects), you can try Xylkene (http://www.amazon.com/Zylkene-75mg-Capsules-30-Count/dp/B00GYHPAFI/?tag=felinediabetesfdmb-20) or Cholodin-FEL, if your vet approves. Zylkene has a very mild calming effect (may not be enough for your cat but worth a shot?)- I've tried it and it made them mellower, though not mellow enough to not freak out going to the vet.

The Cholodin is for mild cognitive issues effecting older cats. I bought it but have not used it yet, but here are some of the Amazon reviews that reminded me of your situation:
"I too have an elderly cat (20 years) who howls in the middle of the night waking my boyfriend and I up. I wasn't sure why she started doing this, and it didn't seem to matter if I fed her right before bedtime (I thought she might be hungry and that's why she cried.)
I guess it's some sort of nutrient deficiency, because she readily ate the chewable tablet and that very night the howling ceased! We were so happy to get a restful night's sleep. For a week now I've fed her one chewable a day and we're all happy. Maybe it's like Valium for cats. :)" --A. Powers

"My old boy is approaching 20 years old. He has signs of cat dementia....yowling like he's being murdered and forgetting that the litter box is the place to do #2. Since he started on Cholodin, which was about 2 - 3 weeks ago, his yowling has decreased remarkably." -C. Hampton

I can't say if it will work, but might be worth a try if your vet is okay with it.
 
Milk contains tryptophan, an amino acid used to make serotonin, a neurotransmitter which may calm some. Turkey contains fairly high amounts of tryptophan too, and this partly explains the sleepiness after a big turkey meal (not to mention that if it was a holiday meal, you might have eaten a fair bit!)
 
Milk also contains casomophin which acts on opiate receptors, and several peptides that act on the benzodiazepine Gaba-A receptors. There's a reason milk is so addictive!
 
@Meya14 - That is really helpful information to me. Out of dire necessity I was on benzos for years. It took further years to taper off them. I'm still suffering from the protracted withdrawal symptoms so typical of benzos. I think maybe I should start drinking milk more regularly. It might help me a lot: my nervous system feels raw most of the time.
 
I had never heard of this, I'll definitely speak with my vet about maybe introducing the Zylkene. And yeah, I think we'll keep the auto-feeder, maybe one or two small meals overnight. I may also buy one of those kinds of toys that hold treats but they have to work somehow to get them out - maybe just set that down for him at night time.
 
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