Does your cat has safe space rituals?

[Lifeisnotalwaysfair]

Our rescue cat has particular spaces that need to be always open, or opened at certain times. For example there's a kitchen cupboard at floor level, in the corner that she can get right into and behind the other units, which has to be open 24 hours a day else she gets upset (meowingand clawing). I have to explain this to the cat sitters.
She also has to go into the garage (off the utility room) every evening, which seems to just be to check it out, so we have to open it for her to 'investigate' for a minute or two.
Our previous cat required the utility room door off the kitchen to be permanently open.
I'm guessing this is 'normal'?

There are no off limits for my cats who loathe closed doors (they manage to open some) and they demand access to everywhere and everyone at all times🤣

Cats are mad !

One of our cats likes us to open the fitted wardrobe in our bedroom every night at about 10pm so she can inspect it before we go to bed. What is very cute is that she knows that we open it with the handle so she signals that she wants it open by stretching her paws up to the handle and miaowing. It is one of those long runs of wardrobes that has several doors and she alternates which one has to be opened.

When we open it she goes inside to check it briefly and then leaves the room and doesn’t come back for the rest of the night.

Totally normal. Even our semi ferals have their safe spaces, one sits in the middle of some red baron grass and peeks out and launches himself at any other passing cat whilst we are walking round the garden every morning. He thinks we can't see him. We all can, the other cats are just messing with him. We call it his jungle.

Our sleeping indoors cat won't have the door to downstairs closed, [our living and sleeping space is all on the first floor] otherwise he panics. He has a special bowl of water down there that only I am allowed to fill for him that the others don't know about [yet]. If he can't get to it, there is absolute panic.

Cats are like little routine machines.

Our girl cat is the cupboard inspector - but, you have to 'accidentally' leave them open - she won't look if she knows you're watching.

Obviously bathroom doors mustn't be closed - especially if you're in there alone.

She will only climb onto my lap from the right hand side, and only from the arm of a chair (so if I sit on the wrong side of the settee I get stared at until I move to the correct side). Ideally I will have a white blanket, not a yellow one, and it will be tucked in under my legs, and my legs must be up. She will cope with one or two of these being wrong, but might have to reset and start again a couple of times before she gains full relaxation.

They also put us to bed and wake us up (or rather make a racket/hang out in the room watching us if we're not doing what we should at the correct time)

Our girl cat is best described as severely autistic. She loves her routine so much that she can get stressed to the point of not eating if we sit in the wrong chairs.

Boy cat likes his routine but he will just loudly (very loudly, he's an Arabian Mau) point out the error of our ways if we have got it wrong. Worst case scenario - the door to 'his cupboard' - actually my wardrobe - is shut. Then he is fuming.

Gave up on closing any doors with my first cats over 20 years ago. It's not worth the stress and wrecked carpets.

I’ve described it on here before but one of mine has a bedtime routine…. I.e. a routine he follows to put the humans to bed. It includes sitting on the edge of the sink to supervise face washing and checking we’ve flushed the loo.

Same cat absolutely cannot bear me going in the bath behind a closed door, it makes him very anxious and he cries at the door the whole time… so I take my baths with the door open and a cat that periodically comes in to check on me. He likes to parade around the (rolltop!!!) bath and DH is insistent that one day he will fall in!

Behind the tv, he can peep from under it but he thinks he can't be seen.

i’ve always had a routine with our boy cat where he gets his dinner about 6.30, we eat about 7, then after we clear up I brush him, and he will usually go out after that. When we adopted him last year I quickly realised he enjoyed being brushed, and he would actively seek it out, so it seemed a good way to build that bond. When he hears the dishwasher being stacked he comes to find me for brush. A few months ago when the weather was very bad I started playing with him with a ribbon after brush, and now he sits at the drawer I keep the ribbons in and shouts at me until I get the ribbon out - every single night.

We ate late on Saturday, because DP was cooking (making an almighty mess) so I did brush/ribbon before we had dinner. Interestingly, as soon as the dishwasher was loaded, Louie popped up, and Saturday was double brush/ribbon. 🤷🏻‍♀️

Our previous girl was like an alarm clock (a very loud one) around meal times and god forbid anyone “overslept” when she should have been getting fed.