Do cats suffer from owner separation anxiety?
Is the cat waiting at the door for you to come home all about food or food and because they miss you?
(I know dogs do)
I deliberately don’t feed my cat when I first get home and whe is always waiting for me, sometimes in the window to watch me walk across the lawn and other times upside down and cute right inside the door. She misses me and wants a cuddle.
My cats “free-feed” - there is always dry food in the bowls. I know when I open the door to the cat suite they’re waiting on me - not on food. When we lived in Hawaii, our cat Morgan le Fey loved Mr. SCL an obscene amount - she only tolerated me. She could hear his car coming up the hill to our quarters - long before I could hear it - and would be waiting at the door for him.
Ditto. Our cats are also free-fed, and even when my wife is home all day, the cats hear my truck pull into the garage and are waiting at the door for me. If I’m not quick with the head-rubs and kisses, they let me hear it! 
When I was in the hospital for hernia surgery, my cat wouldn’t come to bed. He slept by the apartment door and had little to do with anyone other than batting the telephone receiver and crying because he could hear my voice.
Our free-fed cats also wait by the door for us. We’ve just come back from a short vacation and have been receiving extra doses of love and affection. Even Muffin the Seldom-Purrer is spending masses of time on my lap, purring.
I have personal knowledge of cats who were almost inconsolable when their favorite young human went off to college – wandering around the house crying piteously (the cat, not the young human).
My family cats when I was young had, according to parents, great sulks when my sister and I went off to camps and such.
My own cat, now that I live alone, is always waiting for me at the door. According to neighbour, she gets up on the window about a 1/2 hour before my usual arrival time and watches the carpark like a hawk. I can hear her mewing through the glass as I (finally!) approach the house. When she can longer see me from the window (it’s a block of flats and I have to go around to get to the door) she runs to the door and is waiting, lying on her back, ready for The Great Stomach Rub of Approx. 7:15™ when I come in. She doesn’t leave me for a least another half an hour, trotting after me from room to room, shoving her head into my legs and hands hopefully (and usually successfully).
She has dry food and water sitting out for her all day, and she knows she isn’t getting a meat meal until I’ve had my dinner - and she doesn’t care. She’s after company and cuddles. She’s never demanding about food - not like she is about human attention - she eats, sure, but she never even tries to cajole humans into feeding her. She knows it’s coming.
So yeah, I think she’s a people-cat rather a food-cat.
Of course, she toned down this behaviour for a few days after I had to wash her. :smack:
But we’re ok now. 
My cats express their separation anxiety in the form of little presents of dead wildlife, so for the sake of the local fauna I try to keep to a regular schedule.
They get really clingy if they’ve had to stay in the cattery for a few days, and I’m their hero for rescuing them upon my return. They forget it was me that put them there in the first place.
Not only do my two cats have separation anxiety from me (that also come running down stairs as soon as the door opens) but my oldest has separation anxiety from other cats.
When I got my first cat, I got a second within one month. I work 13 hours a day and I didn’t want her to be alone for so long. Arizona (the oldest and first) and George (second cat) grew up together for a year and a half.
One morning I woke up to Arizona howling. She was totally inconsolable. It took me a few minutes to catch on that George was missing. He had gotten out and promptly disappeared. Arizona remained in a sulk until I got another cat for her to hang out with, Spooky.
Our cat will “lose” us in the evenings, and start meowing until we remind her where we are. We’re always in the computer room, but she never remembers. :rolleyes:
Anyways, she started meowing on Saturday. I went and found her as usual, but she started again, and I realized she was meowing FOR THE DOG! Who was merely at the groomer’s. :smack: She was fine when Shilo came home.
Stan and Ollie hear me come in the garage and I see them coming across the kitchen or up the stairs to greet me when I come in.
Most mornings Ollie flops down against the door when I’m putting my shoes on to leave for work. I have to nudge him out of the way so I can leave.
They only get dry food, there’s always plenty in the bowls so it’s not the food, it’s me.
[anecdotal evidence]
Anther pair of free-fed cats here. We just got back from a few days in Vegas. Mom-in-law-Dvl sat for all four of our animals, so they were never quite alone.
As usual, the pooches were much more vocal and exuberant upon our return. When we go to the store, etc., the cats generally meet us at the top of the stairs, say hello and ask for affection, but that’s about the extent of it. This time they were beside themselves.
Grandma doesn’t really play with the animals, so Ash (Housewares) went bonkers, dragging his toys around when we got back, begging to be played with. This was cute considering that half the times he’d fetch, half the times he’d abandon his efforts to run back to us for more pets. Teal’c, who is normally a non-vocal quat, squeaked his little heart out and was much more affectionate than usual. He was also missing some fur, a result of higher-than-normal, anxiety-related cleaning.
The thing that interested us the most was the longevity of the different behaviors. The pooches quieted down in a reasonable amount of time, and settled in to sleep shortly after the initial ohmyohmyohmyyourhome activity. The quats, on the other hand, went at it until we finally went to bed. Their affection/interest level was also much higher than usual for a couple days after we got back, as well. Almost like they had a greater sense of time than the pooches—the pooches think (and act) like we were gone forever even when we just run to the store. The cats notice, but don’t freak out. Seems like this time they recognized that we were gone for an extraordinarily amount of time, and acted accordingly.
[/anecdotal evidence]
Somehow this came to mind: Vacationing Woman Thinks Cats Miss Her.
My cat seems to have separation anxiety when I take a bath, and close her out of the bathroom. I was soaking last night, and she was going nuts, banging against the door and meowing. Not the sharpest pencil she.
Susan
Max Torque, thanks, this is why cat owners scare me. Don’t get me wrong, because I like cats (prefer dogs), but because I know people like this.
Ok so now I am wonderin’. I live alone with my two cats. I am planning going on a long vacation of almost 4 weeks.
Can I leave the cats in my apartment, and have someone come over every three days or so to clean the litter and replenish the food? Or will they suffer from anxiety? What happens when they get separation anxiety, if they do that is?
Any suggestions please? And oh yes, I cannot take the cats with me either.
I think you’ll need to have someone come over a little oftener than that. The water bowl should be washed and refilled at least once a day. And three days is a LOOONGG time between litter box cleanings.
As for the OP, our cats do seem to have missed us when we return after an absence, but I would hesitate to call it separation anxiety. I think they’re more interested in having us pet them and talk to them, and freshen the food bowls. Treats are always good here. Maybe on some primitive, animal level they actually do miss us.
They will be fine, you go and have a great holiday and imagine the great welcome back you’ll get at the end of your trip.