As much as you love your cat, you know there are few things worse than heading into your room ready to fall into bed after a long day, pulling back the covers and finding a nasty, smelly wet spot.
Of course, you banned kitty from the bedroom months ago, but today you forgot to shut the door.
Now you have to change pretty much all the bedding.
It might not even be so bad if that seemingly indestructible odor didn't soak into the mattress and cling to the sheets.
Yuck! If you're fed up with this scenario, learn why cats choose the bed as an alternative litter box and how you can break their habit.
Scent Mixing Separation anxiety is one reason cats take to urinating on the bed.
Because you spend hours in your bed nightly, your bed carries your natural odor, which your cat can smell even if you can't.
Of all the items in the house your bed is the thing that smells the most like you and therefore it reminds your cat of you.
When your cat misses you or fears you might leave, she may try to mix her smell, via her urine, with yours because she find the combination soothing.
Have you been spending a lot of time away or recently changed schedules so that you're not home when your cat expects you to be? If you haven't, has your partner or anyone else using the bed? Bad Kittenhood Habits Sometimes a cat's habit of urinating on the bed may have nothing whatsoever to do with you or anyone else.
Instead, the draw may be the softness and "dig-ableness" of the sheets and blankets.
You may think you or another human trained your cat to use a little box, but in reality, your cat's mother did that job.
Usually, an indoor, litter-box-trained cat shows her kittens how to use the box at the appropriate age.
Sometimes, though, there may be a lot of activity in the house or the box may be too far away and the mother doesn't want to risk carrying the kittens so far.
When this happens, she may let the kittens use the bedding material in the kittening box (the box where the kittens were born) as litter.
Even if the mother cat or you later show the kittens the litter box, they may still carry the habit of using bedding material.
In this case, the cat may use both the litter box and the bed or just decide the bed is comfiest option.
Stopping Kitty's Bed Wetting Naturally, your approach depends on the cause of the cat's urinating on the bed.
If you suspect he's doing it because of someone's absence, try giving the cat an article of clothing or other material that carries the scent of the person the cat misses.
Just be aware your cat may urinate (and ruin) that item.
If the problem is just a bad habit, rest assured that it is possible to "retrain" an adult cat to use the litter box through positive reinforcement.
In the meantime, if you need to keep kitty off the bed or out of the bedroom, try a citrus-scented spray or a cat repellent like Boundary.
Another option is ultrasonic cat house training aid like CatScram.
Remember, too, that separation anxiety and poor litter box training aren't the only reasons a cat might urinate on the bed.
The cause may be any of the many reasons cats avoid the litter box.
For instance, if you have a covered litter box, but your cat hates to go inside, she may be using the bed as the next best thing.
In that case, the solution is to change the box.