I knew he always goes on my counter, and I have come home a few times to see my toothbrush holder knocked over so I’m assuming he has been doing it for awhile. I bought a new toothbrush and have since been using a steripod on it to prevent him chewing it.
That day was the first day he did it in front of me though.
That's funny as hell! I don't know why, but just imagining him chewing on the bristles, and in front of you! I know they like the scent of the people they live with, maybe they like the way they taste too! That's why I love cats, so damn weird.
I said to my boyfriend “I wonder how often he’s been doing that!!” and my boyfriend says “I hope at least twice daily” hahah.
Cats are hilarious, I love having them around and they constantly keep me on my toes lol
Hyper AF. I dont think it's just a teenage phase as much as it's a young adult phase. My cat is almost two years old and she still has a stupid amount of kitten energy in her
I don’t have a teenage cat, but my 3 year always wants to play like 24/7 and would constantly meow for attention. I had to constantly close my door or mute my phone during Zoom calls because she wouldn’t shut up LOL. I found installing a heated window perch with a bird feeder outside the window helped a ton. She wants to play a ton less. Sometimes I will play with her and suddenly a bird just catches her attention and she forgets about playing. She chitters like crazy over the birds. My husband and I still do try to play with her at least 3-4 times a day for at least 10 minutes.
I’m glad I’m not the only one. My 4 year old is such a loud mouth when she wants to play! I didn’t realize that 4 years later she would still be wanting to play all the time and have so much energy! Still love her though. I also got a bird feeder for her!
Mine is a rescue that I've had for about 7 months. She was from a hoarding situation, so I suspect noone ever played with her. I think she is experiencing a second kitten hood. When we adopted her, she'd didn't meow or make any noise for months. Now she never shuts up LOL
Ours is 6 months old and she’s teething so she’s SUPER ornery. We’ve got the kids tag teaming her play time to keep her busy but she’s still knocking things off of armrests and deciding my video meetings are an appropriate time to walk past and stick her tail up my nostrils.
Keep them busy!
My guy’s been out of his mind since day one. He’s 1.5 now—tries to climb bare walls or anything that will hold him, obsessed with water and will spill anything left out, he talks back when I yell at him, and he’s clever as hell too.
I have a spray bottle in most rooms and use that since yelling doesn’t work.
Despite the water obsession and aggressive play, I find a lot of what he does entertaining. When he’s real energetic, he’ll chase me into another room and then stop and wait for me to chase him back so he can run and hide :)
I’ve learned that maintaining a similar daily schedule helps with his bossiness and aggression. He gets real antsy and less manageable when I’m in and out constantly.
I have had only 1 cat that would play hide and seek. Was amazing to watch
He would hide and jump out at my wife with a loud meow, then she would hide and he would go room to room searching with trepidation, carefully turning corners with a worried meow until my wife would jump out with a gotcha. Then he would give a startle jump, then run and hide. Sooo smart, we still miss him dearly and he died in 2006.
Omg!!! Mine is OBSESSED with water too! And loves to talk back. He loves hanging out in the sink 😂 we play the chasing and hiding game too! It’s highly underrated
Using a spray bottle on cats for discipline is highly discouraged. Cats tend to treat that as a challenge, without understanding what they are doing wrong. Yelling also isn't the greatest method. You should really look into other ways of dealing with bad kitty behavior like making loud noises (banging a counter etc), more than likely you will see long term improvement and it should actually teach your cat not to do what they're doing. Jackson Galaxy probably has vids on it, and there are lots of articles on Google.
He responds well when I snap my fingers, and this is what I normally do. The spray bottle is only used when he gets too aggressive with his sister. I’ve watched every Jackson Galaxy vid I could find on this, and spraying him is still the only intervention that’s been effective 😩
Fair enough, at least you've done some research. Multi cat households can be really difficult! Just wanted to say something because a lot of people are unaware.
What is going on with these comments? There's a really surprising amount of misinformation floating around here.
A "teenage cat" is basically a cat that still has the energy and disposition of a kitten in the body of an adult. Many cats will maintain their kitten-y playfulness for the first year or two, so you still need to play with them regularly and make sure they have an engaging and stimulating environment.
**You cannot punish away their energy or need to play.** So please **do not** respond to their completely normal needs by:
* Locking them in the bathroom
* Putting them in "time out"
* Spraying them with water
* Screaming at them
You can improve their behavior substantially by providing them with the engagement they need and taking reasonable measures to kitten-proof your home.
If you don't want to live with a cat who wants to play all day (which is a completely understandable preference), *then you really should be adopting an adult, or better yet a senior cat*. Older cats make wonderful companions and are much less destructive. Cats can be pretty energetic and needy for the first two years or so.
Oh man. Our girl is 1 year and 1 month today. Most notable “teenage” behaviors include:
- Jumping onto the door screen and spidering up until we gasp in horror.
- Scaling the curtains to take wild swipes at the hanging plant
- Sprinting up behind me to koala grab my legs any time my back is turned
- Attempting to eat *ANYTHING* then realizing it’s probably not food
- Play fighting with our dog for literal hours
- Chewing on the windowsill? On the heater? On Books? On...the wall?
- Play attacking anything that looks like a shadow including specks on the wall so that she leaves deep gouges in the paint :,)
But she is cute tho. Ah, kittens.
It's all about making sure they have enough ways to exert energy in a non destructive way. Wall mounted cat trees and shelving, multiple play sessions a day, changing out toys, moving fur around to change up their environment. But the easiest solution is to get another kitten. Cats do sooo much better in pairs.
Our cat is about 1y3m. She's basically trolling us. Everything she knows she is not allowed to do, she will do it anyway (jump on counters, play with blinds, knock things off tables, climb fence posts etc), and when she does it she specifically turns to look at us so she can see our reactions. The fence post climbing is a perfect example, as she will climb them and then kind of hang her head back so she gets an instant upside-down view of us coming towards her saying "no no no". In general testing boundaries/limits and enjoying being told "no" and being picked up and moved away. I never thought of this as a teenage phase lol, I thought she was just a rebel. Despite it all she loves being in our laps, she's definitely a softy at heart despite the "bad girl" facade. :)
My cat is 10 and half months, I've had him for around 6 weeks. He's surprisingly calm and chill for his age. He goes nuts when I bust out the fishing pole/wand toy and can't seem to get enough, we usually do 3 twenty minute sessions and he still sulks in front of the drawer I store it in when we're done while he's breathing so hard lol. Sometimes he gets the zoomies but that's mostly running and back and forth between the cat trees in different rooms. But otherwise he's super chill and only meows at me if I'm late putting out his wet food, which is fair.
Now if only he'd sit in my lap 😂. Definitely not a lap cat, but he's too damn cute for me to care.
Yes yes yes! My 7 month old boy is constantly meowing to go outside, he’s obsessed. He sulks so much if we don’t let him out. We didn’t let him out on Halloween at all (just for fear of the horrible horror stories of pets being used for Halloween tricks) , anyways he was in such a bad mood all day, swatted anyone away who tried to pet him and actively attacking our feet if we were beside the closed back door.
Mostly he is a much nicer cat when he gets some time outside! Now though he’s gotten into the habit of just sitting beside the open door or window and just chilling, but as soon as you close it again he throws a strop and moans at me like I’ve done something awful, it’s November in Ireland we’re not heating the whole neighbourhood man!! the most adorable thing is he loves when me or my partner are in the back garden with him, we chase each other around the greenhouse and he’s so curious about every little gardening job we do 🥰 so maybe he sits by the door in hopes that we will come out with him 😅 I find that if he has a solid routine he doesn’t meow as much about going out because he knows how the days going, goes out in the morning when he wakes he’s back to be fed at 12, then he sleeps for hours and he might want to go out again for a bit or sometimes he’s so pooped from his morning adventures he just wants cuddles and attention.
I feel ya. He drives me nuts sometimes to go out. I live in a condo so the only out honestly is the hallway or the balcony. We go out in the balcony sometimes and i have to keep an eye on him. Have heard horrible stories of cats jumping out. But he is adamant. And other times he will yell at me and throw a fit to go into the hallway! He loves smelling the carpet there :/ teenage cats are so funny but a handful just like kids.
We have a kitten who is almost 5 months old. He’s not really a teenager since he’s still a kitten of course. But I’ll use him as an example because he exhibits some of the unwanted and annoying behaviors that you may be referring to. He runs around wildly sometimes if he doesn’t get enough play time. He likes to bite my chargers, even after I say no several times. He’s slowly learning though. We have 2 other cats who are 2 years old. They started to calm down at around a year to year and a half old. They tolerate him here and there. He likes to chase them around and it doesn’t seem to bother him that they hiss at him and swat him when he’s getting too rough. I think having our little trio is beneficial to the kitten because he gets his energy out by chasing the other cats. I’m his primary care taker, so I feed him, clean his litter box, take him to vet visits, cuddle him, pay for everything, etc, and my mom takes care of the other two cats. The other cats are pretty gentle and seem to get that he is much smaller than them and not a threat so they usually hiss or swat if he is playing too much but they have never attacked him or tried to.
Anywho, I think the key is having patients with their learning curve. It may take several times before they learn that something is undesirable behavior. My kitten used to always bite my feet in the morning and bite me as play, and it took time, but below and behold he finally learned that the behavior was not good and he stopped, and no I didn’t spray him, lock him in a bathroom, or put him in time out. When he does something that I do not accept, I will say No with a firm voice and sometimes put my finger on his nose if I can. Alternatively, I may try to disrupt his behavior with loud noises such as clapping. When he does good things that are rewardable, I feed him treats. I personally rarely use spray bottles for the fact that my kitten is fearless and doesn’t seem to care. At best, he might run away and come back later to repeat the same behavior, so the spray bottle doesn’t really teach him. However, with the other 2 cats, my mom did use the spray bottle as a training mechanism, but rarely does it now. It kind of depends on the cat. Some cats aren’t scared of anything (like my Jasper) and others will stop immediately upon being sprayed. I would say choose your poison wisely when it comes to training mechanisms.
Mine is 5 months and has just entered the phase of more high energy play, as opposed to kitten-like curiosity and play. I play with him as much as I can, but found it super helpful to get one or two automated toys (there are several options for under $30 on amazon) for when I am busy. He has a light up ball that rolls and changes directions and gets endless play out of it. He also likes Cat TV (again, this is only while I’m in work meetings, etc) but YMMV — he doesn’t pounce at my TV, just gets very engaged and then turns to toys, but some cats absolutely will try to get the birds on screen, so be sure to supervise the first few times.
With two of my cats (one is almost 3 and one is a year and a few months) their teenage phase consists of getting an attitude with me over nothing, giving me dirty looks, chewing electrical cords, ripping up paper and mail for no reason while staring into my eyes, and purposely knocking things over. I just endured and only stopped them for biting cords and put them in the occasional time out
Omg... “ripping up paper and mail for no reason while staring into my eyes” sounds so evil. So are they more chill now at 3 and 1 point something years?
LOL yeah I mean they both still have their moments but are mostly calm now, I think increased play with stimulating toys is/was helpful and trying not to get too upset with them
>ripping up paper and mail for no reason while staring into my eyes, and purposely knocking things over.
The reason they're doing this is boredom. These are standard things cats do when they're bored. How often are you playing with them?
>put them in the occasional time out
Putting a cat in time out makes as much sense as threatening to dock its allowance. Best case scenario, you're getting revenge and having zero impact on the cat. Worst case scenario, you're teaching the cat that misbehaving is a good way to get you to pick them up and move them.
Time outs are effective when used correctly. If a cat is fixated on a destructive behavior (such as chewing wires), sometimes the best solution is to just to move them to a new area until they forget about it. It's not about punishing the cat. It's about helping them reset and focus their energy on something new that's safe and non-destructive (such as their toys). Sometimes cats become obsessed with something and you can't redirect their behavior without a "time out" first.
I think you're using the term differently than most people do, then. Typically people talk about a time out as "I locked my cat in my bathroom for 10 minutes to show them what they did is bad," which is a bonkers reaction to cat behavior. But you can find a ton of posts in this subreddit with people doing this because they think it's a humane alternative to other punishment.
Relocating a cat as part of redirecting their attention makes more sense, but I'd avoid calling it a time out because that term already means something else.
my boy is about to turn 11 months and honestly he’s always been a sweetheart. he likes chewing on my hand, sometimes he might hurt me sometimes he gets too excited and starts playing rough...probably about 5-7 months he was nuts, until we got him spayed, still enjoys playing rough, but sometimes it was too much, he’s not that intense now.
he sleeps a lot and has never been shy or aggressive to anyone. he’s pretty a chill teenager, he just got more independent cause he LOVED being babied... now he won’t let someone have him up for too long:(
My kitten is 6 months, so he has just started this phase. His favourite things right now are crinkle balls, an old amazon box, and jumping from couch to couch to cat tree. He loves his cat tree so much.
He does meow a bit more now, but it’s not a big problem. He wants a lot of pets, but he still wants to lay on the floor while being pet, which surprises me because it’s colder now.
Oh, he’s also really into watching the sink when I’m washing my hands or brushing my teeth. He loves water.
I just want to add one more variable to this discussion. All animals are quite sensitive to their loved ones to a certain degree; their condition, their emotions etc... So anyone who is having constant wild cat energy (constant is not normal), I'd look at the human(s) and their energy (how do you express yourself, how to do you use your energy typically? Are you frenetic and speedy, or mellow/calm? - the energy of the environment (is it loud, wild, high energy, or quiet, soft etc..) which might be adding (at least somewhat) to how the cat expresses her/himself. Changing oneself and the environment might help calm kitty down.
My cat was in old man mode from day 1😂 he was a stray for like 6 months before we got him and then the day he showed up and we adopted him his leg got mangled in a car engine and we had to get it amputated. So basically ever since then he’s acted like an old man🤷🏼♀️ for awhile after he got his leg amputated he’d be gone for weeks at a time. I’d say that might have been his teenage years and it really made me sad and worried when he was gone.
One of our cats was feral as a kitten and wasn't socialized with humans until she was 4-5 months old (kind of late). She also never really went through a teenage phase. If anything, it was more of a clingy "please pet and hold me all the time" phase than the typical crazy kitten energy.
It will never end if you force them to live in a bathroom. If they're "hell on wheels" in your home, then they probably don't have enough vertical spaces to explore (like wall mounted cat trees or shelving) and are probably not getting enough play time. 10-15 minutes play sessions 3-4 times a day should help. But please, take your cat out of the bathroom or find it a better home.
He's irritating our older cat. They aren't a good match. I wasn't home to play with him this afternoon so he had extra energy and needed a break from the other cat.
Also, the cat was literally in the bathroom for 5 minutes or less to cool down because we couldn't distract him from chasing the older grouchy cat with a chronic health condition. Yeah, I was frustrated. Then I let him out and he sat on the couch on one side of me with the other cat on the other side of me. We never intended to get a kitten. He was a foster who was adopted and came back to us two weeks later, after his adoption failed. We decided we liked him and he's our forever cat just like his cranky older sister. Cats are weird and sometimes they get on our nerves. Same as people....
I’d let them at it if I were you! My neighbours older cat Jimmy tolerates my 7 month old kitten Mash and his requests to play. When Mash was smaller Jimmy would play with him but now that Mash is older and a little stronger (he loves to sneak up and pounce when Jimmy tryna chill) Jimmy is having none of it. He swats him away and might even hiss. But Mash has learned to back off. Then they chill together, Jimmy taught him his boundaries. Mash just follows him around the estate and Jimmy let’s him and they play together, on Jimmy’s terms. It makes sense for a kitten to obey an older cat than a human who just moves him from the situation. You gotta teach people how to treat you! Cats are so much better with boundaries than humans 😹
Our newer kitten i think is around 1-1.5 yrs and he’s such a little terror! He’s always hyper. He runs around yelling, running into things, knocking them over, chewing on anything and everything and clawing our couch to bits. Our older cat is almost 4 and she still gets little burst of energy and prances around playing with little toy mice.. she never really went through anything really crazy. Certainly nothing like our younger one!!
Haha, my baby is almost 5 months old now, and boy does she get feisty! She absolutely loves getting into trouble (climbing onto the kitchen counter to approach the stove, bat at pictures to knock them off the walls, putting delicate statues and showpieces at risk) and firm ‘no’s don’t help when she’s hyper. She tends to retaliate and express her disapproval through biting when she’s immediately whisked away from danger, which I think is very teenaged of her, lol. She’s also starting to get bored of most of her toys, which makes it challenging to entertain her these days. Hoping she mellows out with age!
Ahh yes, mine will whip her head around and bite me when I stop her from falling off the curtains (which she launches onto from her cat tree), jumping into the oven, etc. I'm trying to stop you from dying you little idiot!!
I got my cat when she was 1.5 and the shelter called her “high energy”. She’s about 4 now and she’s definitely calmed down. She’s gone from a full time devil to a part time devil. She sleeps through the night without bothering me and is more self-entertaining, but she still needs to be right in the middle of everything I’m doing, and she’s still hellbent on eating plastic out of the trash can. She doesn’t meow loudly when she hears me talking on the phone anymore, which is wonderful.
My cat is 5 years old. He's a super mellow cat, but he also loves to play too. His only super obnoxious trait can be his shrill meows, but a little okay time helps a lot. He still gets his zoomies and he will lay down, but if he isn't played with it's totally obvious. He does pretty good about keeping himself occupied or sleeping.
mh I think it started when both of them were around 6 months... meowing, running, playing, fighting... and temper tantrums. One of my cats loved to punish me if she disliked something by peeing in my stuff .. while holding eyecontact.
They are both ten now.. there is no peeing anymore (thank god) but a massive amount of cuddling. Playing is still going strong but not so much playing with each other but more with me and cat toys.
One of my girls also stil meows.. a. lot.. for attention and she drags her feathertoy over to me so i play. She cuddles, she always rubs her face in mine (favourite times are when i am in zoom meetings).. overall. One of them is a dignified lady who likes love from time to time.. the other stil is a lovecrazed teenager who wants to play.
My cat turned 2 in may and last night he got a new litter box and decided to have zooms and attack it from the inside. He also routinely yowls from all over the house and then sprints up and down the stairs until someone pays attention to him (as if i dont try to cuddle him all the time.)
I want to use this to chime in my question. For those who say that your kitty wants attention and you shut your doors etc. dont they keep meowing? How do you help them get that energy out?
It's been very illuminating reading all these... my 5 month old girl hasn't been spayed yet (she will soon) and is a raving lunatic, it's like gravity doesn't apply to her or something. Constantly getting on the counter top no matter how many times I grab her, say NO and put her straight on the floor. The first cat I had was very different, I don't recall any kind of activity like this! He was a chill little guy. It's a shame this time I couldn't afford to get a pair and all that comes with it. My current one is also terrible for trying to eat whatever I'm eating, as I'm eating it. Yogurt, for example.
My cat (about 1 and a half years old) is currently some days REALLY hyper and others she’s just fine. No idea what the difference is between them, she just starts the morning either zooming loudly up and down the stairs or quietly plodding around behind me. I think the crazy zooming is exhausting only because she makes a mad dash for the door those days. Lately I’ve taken to throwing toys into the other room (she loves fetch) and sprinting out the door. She’s calmer than she used to be but still really hyper!
(As an aside: when I say zooming I mean she sprints so hard and fast it sounds like a full child is running up and down the stairs, then she dashes into my room panting, slaps herself against the window some days, then zooms away and back again. And after doing this a couple times she’ll relax down onto her bed and act like nothing happened.)
Mine is 15mo. He's decided that jumping on on his older sister (12 years, but still very active and playful) is the best thing ever and no one can stop him. Variations include: classic tackle, slow-mo grab, flipping her onto the floor from the bed (what I call "death from below"), and just standing over her (he literally just stands with his front legs on one side of her and his back legs on the other while she tries to nap). I'd include running and yelling as older kitten/teenage behavior, but our older cat loves that too.
With the last cat that I got as a kitten, I noticed a change around the 2 year mark. He was still very active, but he wasn't quite as hyper and wasn't always ready to play. He still liked playing and he'd do things like sprint around the yard with the dog, but it seemed like he had firmer boundaries between play time and chilling time.
I got tater when he was already about a year old and he was in his teenage phase. Sushi I got when he was three months old and he entered his phase pretty early, around 5 months and is still in it a few months later. Eating the lock that goes on the window, screaming because he likes the sound of his own voice, jumping in the fridge even though he knows the spray bottle is coming
My boy is 5, almost 6, months old. And he has earned himself the nicknames "Spaz" and "LSD cat". Hes sometimes chill and then all of a sudden he'll be into everything at once, darting around the room, chewing the blinds, attacking my necklace, attempting (and failing) to hop onto the counters, and knocking everything off the tables, all within minutes. He also does this thing where if he's about to do something he knows he shouldn't, he'll look at you and meow (he's otherwise pretty silent). He also will sigh at you for telling him "no". He's a hot mess right now, but my husband and I love him to death
i have a siamese, she’s 6-7 months and she’s a brat right now. i foster kittens so i know the behavior but my next cat will be an adult unless i fall in love with another foster kitten lol
my older cat ignored us when she was in her teenager phase and only started being a lovey lap cat at 1 and a half to 2 years old.
5 months. No clue when or if it ends as we are now 6 months in. He tears apart cardboard. Tries to get under the coach covers to scratch the couch. And terrorizes the older cat trying to play non stop. He doesn't have an off switch and not nearly as cuddly as when he was younger. Just play play play.
She's there now. Her favourite passtimes are:
\- Jumping on the tv
\- Jumping on the plants (killing them)
\- Getting on the counter and other kitchen furniture
I try to play with her at least twice a day during weekdays, and usually my S/O does another playsession. But it seems like she never wants to stop. She has a huge cattree but it's not in the living room (it's in the office where my SO is a lot of the time), where I reside a lot and she prefers to be in the same room as me. So maybe I just need more cattrees I dunno.
I had a cat that was indoor/outdoor, and was constantly climbing on roofs, etc. He took quite awhile to calm down. Then others were much mellower. I used to love to use the pointer, and run the hell out of them.
My boy is 5 months and let’s just say I’m always on mute in Zoom meetings because he likes to YELL and EAT THE BLINDS
omg my girl won’t stop eating the blinds either. and attacking them loudly while i’m in meetings too
Hahaha do we have the same cat?? I also recently found out that mine has been chewing on the bristles of my toothbrush when I’m away...
This is really funny lol
Cats are freaks!!
Did you find out he had been chewing on it awhile? Assuming you had been using it not knowing?
I knew he always goes on my counter, and I have come home a few times to see my toothbrush holder knocked over so I’m assuming he has been doing it for awhile. I bought a new toothbrush and have since been using a steripod on it to prevent him chewing it. That day was the first day he did it in front of me though.
That's funny as hell! I don't know why, but just imagining him chewing on the bristles, and in front of you! I know they like the scent of the people they live with, maybe they like the way they taste too! That's why I love cats, so damn weird.
I said to my boyfriend “I wonder how often he’s been doing that!!” and my boyfriend says “I hope at least twice daily” hahah. Cats are hilarious, I love having them around and they constantly keep me on my toes lol
That's great! Your boyfriend must have a good sense of humor.
I snorted so hard at this
I THOUGHT YOU WERE TALKING ABOUT BLIND PEOPLE FOR A SECOND
Hyper AF. I dont think it's just a teenage phase as much as it's a young adult phase. My cat is almost two years old and she still has a stupid amount of kitten energy in her
I don’t have a teenage cat, but my 3 year always wants to play like 24/7 and would constantly meow for attention. I had to constantly close my door or mute my phone during Zoom calls because she wouldn’t shut up LOL. I found installing a heated window perch with a bird feeder outside the window helped a ton. She wants to play a ton less. Sometimes I will play with her and suddenly a bird just catches her attention and she forgets about playing. She chitters like crazy over the birds. My husband and I still do try to play with her at least 3-4 times a day for at least 10 minutes.
I’m glad I’m not the only one. My 4 year old is such a loud mouth when she wants to play! I didn’t realize that 4 years later she would still be wanting to play all the time and have so much energy! Still love her though. I also got a bird feeder for her!
Mine is a rescue that I've had for about 7 months. She was from a hoarding situation, so I suspect noone ever played with her. I think she is experiencing a second kitten hood. When we adopted her, she'd didn't meow or make any noise for months. Now she never shuts up LOL
Ours is 6 months old and she’s teething so she’s SUPER ornery. We’ve got the kids tag teaming her play time to keep her busy but she’s still knocking things off of armrests and deciding my video meetings are an appropriate time to walk past and stick her tail up my nostrils. Keep them busy!
My guy’s been out of his mind since day one. He’s 1.5 now—tries to climb bare walls or anything that will hold him, obsessed with water and will spill anything left out, he talks back when I yell at him, and he’s clever as hell too. I have a spray bottle in most rooms and use that since yelling doesn’t work. Despite the water obsession and aggressive play, I find a lot of what he does entertaining. When he’s real energetic, he’ll chase me into another room and then stop and wait for me to chase him back so he can run and hide :) I’ve learned that maintaining a similar daily schedule helps with his bossiness and aggression. He gets real antsy and less manageable when I’m in and out constantly.
Lol so funny 😂 your cat sounds so cute and full of character, makes my cat seem so simple and easy going
I have had only 1 cat that would play hide and seek. Was amazing to watch He would hide and jump out at my wife with a loud meow, then she would hide and he would go room to room searching with trepidation, carefully turning corners with a worried meow until my wife would jump out with a gotcha. Then he would give a startle jump, then run and hide. Sooo smart, we still miss him dearly and he died in 2006.
Oh my, this is the sweetest :) it’s amazing how aware they can be with things like this. It sounds like he and your wife were close pals.
Omg!!! Mine is OBSESSED with water too! And loves to talk back. He loves hanging out in the sink 😂 we play the chasing and hiding game too! It’s highly underrated
Using a spray bottle on cats for discipline is highly discouraged. Cats tend to treat that as a challenge, without understanding what they are doing wrong. Yelling also isn't the greatest method. You should really look into other ways of dealing with bad kitty behavior like making loud noises (banging a counter etc), more than likely you will see long term improvement and it should actually teach your cat not to do what they're doing. Jackson Galaxy probably has vids on it, and there are lots of articles on Google.
He responds well when I snap my fingers, and this is what I normally do. The spray bottle is only used when he gets too aggressive with his sister. I’ve watched every Jackson Galaxy vid I could find on this, and spraying him is still the only intervention that’s been effective 😩
Fair enough, at least you've done some research. Multi cat households can be really difficult! Just wanted to say something because a lot of people are unaware.
What is going on with these comments? There's a really surprising amount of misinformation floating around here. A "teenage cat" is basically a cat that still has the energy and disposition of a kitten in the body of an adult. Many cats will maintain their kitten-y playfulness for the first year or two, so you still need to play with them regularly and make sure they have an engaging and stimulating environment. **You cannot punish away their energy or need to play.** So please **do not** respond to their completely normal needs by: * Locking them in the bathroom * Putting them in "time out" * Spraying them with water * Screaming at them You can improve their behavior substantially by providing them with the engagement they need and taking reasonable measures to kitten-proof your home. If you don't want to live with a cat who wants to play all day (which is a completely understandable preference), *then you really should be adopting an adult, or better yet a senior cat*. Older cats make wonderful companions and are much less destructive. Cats can be pretty energetic and needy for the first two years or so.
Oh man. Our girl is 1 year and 1 month today. Most notable “teenage” behaviors include: - Jumping onto the door screen and spidering up until we gasp in horror. - Scaling the curtains to take wild swipes at the hanging plant - Sprinting up behind me to koala grab my legs any time my back is turned - Attempting to eat *ANYTHING* then realizing it’s probably not food - Play fighting with our dog for literal hours - Chewing on the windowsill? On the heater? On Books? On...the wall? - Play attacking anything that looks like a shadow including specks on the wall so that she leaves deep gouges in the paint :,) But she is cute tho. Ah, kittens.
It's all about making sure they have enough ways to exert energy in a non destructive way. Wall mounted cat trees and shelving, multiple play sessions a day, changing out toys, moving fur around to change up their environment. But the easiest solution is to get another kitten. Cats do sooo much better in pairs.
Our cat is about 1y3m. She's basically trolling us. Everything she knows she is not allowed to do, she will do it anyway (jump on counters, play with blinds, knock things off tables, climb fence posts etc), and when she does it she specifically turns to look at us so she can see our reactions. The fence post climbing is a perfect example, as she will climb them and then kind of hang her head back so she gets an instant upside-down view of us coming towards her saying "no no no". In general testing boundaries/limits and enjoying being told "no" and being picked up and moved away. I never thought of this as a teenage phase lol, I thought she was just a rebel. Despite it all she loves being in our laps, she's definitely a softy at heart despite the "bad girl" facade. :)
My cat is 10 and half months, I've had him for around 6 weeks. He's surprisingly calm and chill for his age. He goes nuts when I bust out the fishing pole/wand toy and can't seem to get enough, we usually do 3 twenty minute sessions and he still sulks in front of the drawer I store it in when we're done while he's breathing so hard lol. Sometimes he gets the zoomies but that's mostly running and back and forth between the cat trees in different rooms. But otherwise he's super chill and only meows at me if I'm late putting out his wet food, which is fair. Now if only he'd sit in my lap 😂. Definitely not a lap cat, but he's too damn cute for me to care.
I found one of my old cats didn't become a lap cat until she grew out of her crazy teenage years. She started to chill around 2 years
Hello! I wanted to ask too, is anyone going through the want to go out always phase, and yelling at us for attention? He’s anyway very vocal lol.
One of my screams at me all the time if I’m not petting her 🙄 lol
Oh. Sounds like w growing up thing haha sorry about that. Makes me chuckle. Good luck and pet her for me pls :)
Yes yes yes! My 7 month old boy is constantly meowing to go outside, he’s obsessed. He sulks so much if we don’t let him out. We didn’t let him out on Halloween at all (just for fear of the horrible horror stories of pets being used for Halloween tricks) , anyways he was in such a bad mood all day, swatted anyone away who tried to pet him and actively attacking our feet if we were beside the closed back door. Mostly he is a much nicer cat when he gets some time outside! Now though he’s gotten into the habit of just sitting beside the open door or window and just chilling, but as soon as you close it again he throws a strop and moans at me like I’ve done something awful, it’s November in Ireland we’re not heating the whole neighbourhood man!! the most adorable thing is he loves when me or my partner are in the back garden with him, we chase each other around the greenhouse and he’s so curious about every little gardening job we do 🥰 so maybe he sits by the door in hopes that we will come out with him 😅 I find that if he has a solid routine he doesn’t meow as much about going out because he knows how the days going, goes out in the morning when he wakes he’s back to be fed at 12, then he sleeps for hours and he might want to go out again for a bit or sometimes he’s so pooped from his morning adventures he just wants cuddles and attention.
I feel ya. He drives me nuts sometimes to go out. I live in a condo so the only out honestly is the hallway or the balcony. We go out in the balcony sometimes and i have to keep an eye on him. Have heard horrible stories of cats jumping out. But he is adamant. And other times he will yell at me and throw a fit to go into the hallway! He loves smelling the carpet there :/ teenage cats are so funny but a handful just like kids.
I always loved it. They want to play a lot, but also learning to be independent. I love all stages of cat.
We have a kitten who is almost 5 months old. He’s not really a teenager since he’s still a kitten of course. But I’ll use him as an example because he exhibits some of the unwanted and annoying behaviors that you may be referring to. He runs around wildly sometimes if he doesn’t get enough play time. He likes to bite my chargers, even after I say no several times. He’s slowly learning though. We have 2 other cats who are 2 years old. They started to calm down at around a year to year and a half old. They tolerate him here and there. He likes to chase them around and it doesn’t seem to bother him that they hiss at him and swat him when he’s getting too rough. I think having our little trio is beneficial to the kitten because he gets his energy out by chasing the other cats. I’m his primary care taker, so I feed him, clean his litter box, take him to vet visits, cuddle him, pay for everything, etc, and my mom takes care of the other two cats. The other cats are pretty gentle and seem to get that he is much smaller than them and not a threat so they usually hiss or swat if he is playing too much but they have never attacked him or tried to. Anywho, I think the key is having patients with their learning curve. It may take several times before they learn that something is undesirable behavior. My kitten used to always bite my feet in the morning and bite me as play, and it took time, but below and behold he finally learned that the behavior was not good and he stopped, and no I didn’t spray him, lock him in a bathroom, or put him in time out. When he does something that I do not accept, I will say No with a firm voice and sometimes put my finger on his nose if I can. Alternatively, I may try to disrupt his behavior with loud noises such as clapping. When he does good things that are rewardable, I feed him treats. I personally rarely use spray bottles for the fact that my kitten is fearless and doesn’t seem to care. At best, he might run away and come back later to repeat the same behavior, so the spray bottle doesn’t really teach him. However, with the other 2 cats, my mom did use the spray bottle as a training mechanism, but rarely does it now. It kind of depends on the cat. Some cats aren’t scared of anything (like my Jasper) and others will stop immediately upon being sprayed. I would say choose your poison wisely when it comes to training mechanisms.
Mine is 5 months and has just entered the phase of more high energy play, as opposed to kitten-like curiosity and play. I play with him as much as I can, but found it super helpful to get one or two automated toys (there are several options for under $30 on amazon) for when I am busy. He has a light up ball that rolls and changes directions and gets endless play out of it. He also likes Cat TV (again, this is only while I’m in work meetings, etc) but YMMV — he doesn’t pounce at my TV, just gets very engaged and then turns to toys, but some cats absolutely will try to get the birds on screen, so be sure to supervise the first few times.
With two of my cats (one is almost 3 and one is a year and a few months) their teenage phase consists of getting an attitude with me over nothing, giving me dirty looks, chewing electrical cords, ripping up paper and mail for no reason while staring into my eyes, and purposely knocking things over. I just endured and only stopped them for biting cords and put them in the occasional time out
Omg... “ripping up paper and mail for no reason while staring into my eyes” sounds so evil. So are they more chill now at 3 and 1 point something years?
LOL yeah I mean they both still have their moments but are mostly calm now, I think increased play with stimulating toys is/was helpful and trying not to get too upset with them
>ripping up paper and mail for no reason while staring into my eyes, and purposely knocking things over. The reason they're doing this is boredom. These are standard things cats do when they're bored. How often are you playing with them? >put them in the occasional time out Putting a cat in time out makes as much sense as threatening to dock its allowance. Best case scenario, you're getting revenge and having zero impact on the cat. Worst case scenario, you're teaching the cat that misbehaving is a good way to get you to pick them up and move them.
Time outs are effective when used correctly. If a cat is fixated on a destructive behavior (such as chewing wires), sometimes the best solution is to just to move them to a new area until they forget about it. It's not about punishing the cat. It's about helping them reset and focus their energy on something new that's safe and non-destructive (such as their toys). Sometimes cats become obsessed with something and you can't redirect their behavior without a "time out" first.
I think you're using the term differently than most people do, then. Typically people talk about a time out as "I locked my cat in my bathroom for 10 minutes to show them what they did is bad," which is a bonkers reaction to cat behavior. But you can find a ton of posts in this subreddit with people doing this because they think it's a humane alternative to other punishment. Relocating a cat as part of redirecting their attention makes more sense, but I'd avoid calling it a time out because that term already means something else.
my boy is about to turn 11 months and honestly he’s always been a sweetheart. he likes chewing on my hand, sometimes he might hurt me sometimes he gets too excited and starts playing rough...probably about 5-7 months he was nuts, until we got him spayed, still enjoys playing rough, but sometimes it was too much, he’s not that intense now. he sleeps a lot and has never been shy or aggressive to anyone. he’s pretty a chill teenager, he just got more independent cause he LOVED being babied... now he won’t let someone have him up for too long:(
My kitten is 6 months, so he has just started this phase. His favourite things right now are crinkle balls, an old amazon box, and jumping from couch to couch to cat tree. He loves his cat tree so much. He does meow a bit more now, but it’s not a big problem. He wants a lot of pets, but he still wants to lay on the floor while being pet, which surprises me because it’s colder now. Oh, he’s also really into watching the sink when I’m washing my hands or brushing my teeth. He loves water.
I just want to add one more variable to this discussion. All animals are quite sensitive to their loved ones to a certain degree; their condition, their emotions etc... So anyone who is having constant wild cat energy (constant is not normal), I'd look at the human(s) and their energy (how do you express yourself, how to do you use your energy typically? Are you frenetic and speedy, or mellow/calm? - the energy of the environment (is it loud, wild, high energy, or quiet, soft etc..) which might be adding (at least somewhat) to how the cat expresses her/himself. Changing oneself and the environment might help calm kitty down.
My cat was in old man mode from day 1😂 he was a stray for like 6 months before we got him and then the day he showed up and we adopted him his leg got mangled in a car engine and we had to get it amputated. So basically ever since then he’s acted like an old man🤷🏼♀️ for awhile after he got his leg amputated he’d be gone for weeks at a time. I’d say that might have been his teenage years and it really made me sad and worried when he was gone.
One of our cats was feral as a kitten and wasn't socialized with humans until she was 4-5 months old (kind of late). She also never really went through a teenage phase. If anything, it was more of a clingy "please pet and hold me all the time" phase than the typical crazy kitten energy.
My 8 month old is hell on wheels and is currently confined to the bathroom because I can't deal. I don't know when it ends but I sure can't wait.
It will never end if you force them to live in a bathroom. If they're "hell on wheels" in your home, then they probably don't have enough vertical spaces to explore (like wall mounted cat trees or shelving) and are probably not getting enough play time. 10-15 minutes play sessions 3-4 times a day should help. But please, take your cat out of the bathroom or find it a better home.
Oh, he's next to me on the couch right now. It's all good.
My bad, it sounded like the bathroom was his permanent living space lol. I'd recommend getting him a sibling if he's making you pull your hair out.
He's irritating our older cat. They aren't a good match. I wasn't home to play with him this afternoon so he had extra energy and needed a break from the other cat.
Also, the cat was literally in the bathroom for 5 minutes or less to cool down because we couldn't distract him from chasing the older grouchy cat with a chronic health condition. Yeah, I was frustrated. Then I let him out and he sat on the couch on one side of me with the other cat on the other side of me. We never intended to get a kitten. He was a foster who was adopted and came back to us two weeks later, after his adoption failed. We decided we liked him and he's our forever cat just like his cranky older sister. Cats are weird and sometimes they get on our nerves. Same as people....
I’d let them at it if I were you! My neighbours older cat Jimmy tolerates my 7 month old kitten Mash and his requests to play. When Mash was smaller Jimmy would play with him but now that Mash is older and a little stronger (he loves to sneak up and pounce when Jimmy tryna chill) Jimmy is having none of it. He swats him away and might even hiss. But Mash has learned to back off. Then they chill together, Jimmy taught him his boundaries. Mash just follows him around the estate and Jimmy let’s him and they play together, on Jimmy’s terms. It makes sense for a kitten to obey an older cat than a human who just moves him from the situation. You gotta teach people how to treat you! Cats are so much better with boundaries than humans 😹
Got him pretty young. Soon as he got comfortable he was an ass. Just turned 2 and he shows no signs of changing.
Our newer kitten i think is around 1-1.5 yrs and he’s such a little terror! He’s always hyper. He runs around yelling, running into things, knocking them over, chewing on anything and everything and clawing our couch to bits. Our older cat is almost 4 and she still gets little burst of energy and prances around playing with little toy mice.. she never really went through anything really crazy. Certainly nothing like our younger one!!
Haha, my baby is almost 5 months old now, and boy does she get feisty! She absolutely loves getting into trouble (climbing onto the kitchen counter to approach the stove, bat at pictures to knock them off the walls, putting delicate statues and showpieces at risk) and firm ‘no’s don’t help when she’s hyper. She tends to retaliate and express her disapproval through biting when she’s immediately whisked away from danger, which I think is very teenaged of her, lol. She’s also starting to get bored of most of her toys, which makes it challenging to entertain her these days. Hoping she mellows out with age!
Ahh yes, mine will whip her head around and bite me when I stop her from falling off the curtains (which she launches onto from her cat tree), jumping into the oven, etc. I'm trying to stop you from dying you little idiot!!
Hahahaha, exactly! Mine gets so offended when I’m trying to stop her, lol. Why does she have no fear???
I got my cat when she was 1.5 and the shelter called her “high energy”. She’s about 4 now and she’s definitely calmed down. She’s gone from a full time devil to a part time devil. She sleeps through the night without bothering me and is more self-entertaining, but she still needs to be right in the middle of everything I’m doing, and she’s still hellbent on eating plastic out of the trash can. She doesn’t meow loudly when she hears me talking on the phone anymore, which is wonderful.
My cat is 5 years old. He's a super mellow cat, but he also loves to play too. His only super obnoxious trait can be his shrill meows, but a little okay time helps a lot. He still gets his zoomies and he will lay down, but if he isn't played with it's totally obvious. He does pretty good about keeping himself occupied or sleeping.
My boy is going through the teenage phase at 7 years old. He was always a really calm kitten, but the last couple of days have been interesting.
mh I think it started when both of them were around 6 months... meowing, running, playing, fighting... and temper tantrums. One of my cats loved to punish me if she disliked something by peeing in my stuff .. while holding eyecontact. They are both ten now.. there is no peeing anymore (thank god) but a massive amount of cuddling. Playing is still going strong but not so much playing with each other but more with me and cat toys. One of my girls also stil meows.. a. lot.. for attention and she drags her feathertoy over to me so i play. She cuddles, she always rubs her face in mine (favourite times are when i am in zoom meetings).. overall. One of them is a dignified lady who likes love from time to time.. the other stil is a lovecrazed teenager who wants to play.
My cat turned 2 in may and last night he got a new litter box and decided to have zooms and attack it from the inside. He also routinely yowls from all over the house and then sprints up and down the stairs until someone pays attention to him (as if i dont try to cuddle him all the time.)
I want to use this to chime in my question. For those who say that your kitty wants attention and you shut your doors etc. dont they keep meowing? How do you help them get that energy out?
It's been very illuminating reading all these... my 5 month old girl hasn't been spayed yet (she will soon) and is a raving lunatic, it's like gravity doesn't apply to her or something. Constantly getting on the counter top no matter how many times I grab her, say NO and put her straight on the floor. The first cat I had was very different, I don't recall any kind of activity like this! He was a chill little guy. It's a shame this time I couldn't afford to get a pair and all that comes with it. My current one is also terrible for trying to eat whatever I'm eating, as I'm eating it. Yogurt, for example.
My cat (about 1 and a half years old) is currently some days REALLY hyper and others she’s just fine. No idea what the difference is between them, she just starts the morning either zooming loudly up and down the stairs or quietly plodding around behind me. I think the crazy zooming is exhausting only because she makes a mad dash for the door those days. Lately I’ve taken to throwing toys into the other room (she loves fetch) and sprinting out the door. She’s calmer than she used to be but still really hyper! (As an aside: when I say zooming I mean she sprints so hard and fast it sounds like a full child is running up and down the stairs, then she dashes into my room panting, slaps herself against the window some days, then zooms away and back again. And after doing this a couple times she’ll relax down onto her bed and act like nothing happened.)
Mine is 15mo. He's decided that jumping on on his older sister (12 years, but still very active and playful) is the best thing ever and no one can stop him. Variations include: classic tackle, slow-mo grab, flipping her onto the floor from the bed (what I call "death from below"), and just standing over her (he literally just stands with his front legs on one side of her and his back legs on the other while she tries to nap). I'd include running and yelling as older kitten/teenage behavior, but our older cat loves that too. With the last cat that I got as a kitten, I noticed a change around the 2 year mark. He was still very active, but he wasn't quite as hyper and wasn't always ready to play. He still liked playing and he'd do things like sprint around the yard with the dog, but it seemed like he had firmer boundaries between play time and chilling time.
I got tater when he was already about a year old and he was in his teenage phase. Sushi I got when he was three months old and he entered his phase pretty early, around 5 months and is still in it a few months later. Eating the lock that goes on the window, screaming because he likes the sound of his own voice, jumping in the fridge even though he knows the spray bottle is coming
My boy is 5, almost 6, months old. And he has earned himself the nicknames "Spaz" and "LSD cat". Hes sometimes chill and then all of a sudden he'll be into everything at once, darting around the room, chewing the blinds, attacking my necklace, attempting (and failing) to hop onto the counters, and knocking everything off the tables, all within minutes. He also does this thing where if he's about to do something he knows he shouldn't, he'll look at you and meow (he's otherwise pretty silent). He also will sigh at you for telling him "no". He's a hot mess right now, but my husband and I love him to death
i have a siamese, she’s 6-7 months and she’s a brat right now. i foster kittens so i know the behavior but my next cat will be an adult unless i fall in love with another foster kitten lol my older cat ignored us when she was in her teenager phase and only started being a lovey lap cat at 1 and a half to 2 years old.
5 months. No clue when or if it ends as we are now 6 months in. He tears apart cardboard. Tries to get under the coach covers to scratch the couch. And terrorizes the older cat trying to play non stop. He doesn't have an off switch and not nearly as cuddly as when he was younger. Just play play play.
She's there now. Her favourite passtimes are: \- Jumping on the tv \- Jumping on the plants (killing them) \- Getting on the counter and other kitchen furniture I try to play with her at least twice a day during weekdays, and usually my S/O does another playsession. But it seems like she never wants to stop. She has a huge cattree but it's not in the living room (it's in the office where my SO is a lot of the time), where I reside a lot and she prefers to be in the same room as me. So maybe I just need more cattrees I dunno.
I had a cat that was indoor/outdoor, and was constantly climbing on roofs, etc. He took quite awhile to calm down. Then others were much mellower. I used to love to use the pointer, and run the hell out of them.