My cat is driving me mad !

Our cat is about 10 years old and is driving me mad. I put food down for her, she looks at it and walks away, I sit down and she jumps up on me and bites me (hard) so that I have to get up and put more food in her bowl, she will then eat some of it. At night, if I try to put her outside, she hides, until I get into bed when she jumps on me and starts biting again. I get up and try to go downstairs but each time I put my foot on the next step she bites me, so we end up with a stand off . I get back into bed and she comes and bites me again. So we do the stair thing again.

This happens every night and I know it sounds funny but I’m really fed up with being bitten. If I wear slippers she goes for my ankles. I’ve tried throwing a pencil ( she loves pencils) down the stairs for her to chase but she won’t budge. It can take over an hour to get her outside and I’m tired , I don’t want to be playing silly buggers at 1:30 am !