I think mine is just making sure I'm alive

She will wake me up if I sleep later than usual, but if I "mrow" and pat her head, she'll lay next to me and let me go back to sleep

My dogs seem to know what days of the week are, because if I wake up early (before 10 am) on a weekend, they are both so offended that I woke them. But if I don't wake up on time (7:15) on a week day, they harass the fuck outta me until I get out of bed.

No but my kitty meows at me when she thinks it's time for me to go to bed. She really just wants cuddles. It's adorable.

Yeah, so we got an automatic feeder that drops kibble at 5am so he goes back to sleep. Problem solved

Worse: Dogs. They love their routines, so since sleeping in is not the routine they jump all over me (often on my freaking nuts) until I stick to the routine.

The strays fighting and/or fucking right outside my window at 3am is a different issue.

no, but if I wait too long to feed my dogs then one of them will go puke on the rug and the other will climb on my chest and start making hoarking noises over my face

You're fucking up the routine!

The reason for this is that on holidays and weekends when people allow themselves to sleep past their usual waking times they enter a lighter sleep called the Nessun Dormant phase characterised by unconscious singing like Pavarotti, which can unsettle pets.

I'm currently babysitting my brother's cat and the other morning she gently put her face in my ear and meowed, jolting me awake

Yeah. Whenever we try to sleep in past 5AM, one of our cats freaks out 😭

We used to leave out kibble and let our cats graze, but two of them are getting elderly and have weak teeth. My wife took pity on them and started supplementing their diet with wet food every morning.

I don't think there's anyone in the house who doesn't regret that decision being made.

Yep. My cat is on a diet of half a cup a day. So for the two hours before I wake up, he has his say.

Simple trick.

Feed them at night.

Oof, I have a cat like this. Usually she's not too bad, but if she gets agitated at all she's a horror story. 17 years of this, too. Normally, it's better to just tire the cat out with playtime during the day at a time more convenient for you. She wants attention, mostly. If cats didn't have social needs they wouldn't make good pets, and cats do have a strong need to socialize with their humans. Normally she's good and only comes in at about 9, 9.30am when I usually want to get up. But sometimes she gets it into her head that we need to be up much earlier, usually if we're having trouble sleeping and she notices we're sort of awake. Or lately she wants the faceted crystal baubles in the window to throw off rainbows for her to attack, but it's the wrong time and she doesn't get it and thinks we activate it. She'll take me to the stair window first thing when I get up, and put her paws up on the sill and complain and complain, but there's aught I can do!

The contrast is that if I or my partner are feeling sick or depressed in the morning, she's just the sweetest, kindest creature and will just snuggle and purr, and won't care what time you finally get up. But if you're healthy? Forget it. We say that she's Momma to our Owen, for those of you who have seen Throw Momma From the Train.

No

Noise machine and fan on, cats not allowed in the bedroom. Simple as.