Why Is My Cat Acting Differently Since I Got Back From Holiday?

You walk in the door, drop the bags, and your cat… pointedly walks out of the room. Or won’t leave your side for three days. Or — the classic — has strong opinions about your suitcase, expressed in the least welcome way possible. Post-holiday behaviour changes are one of the most common things cat owners ask us about, so here’s what’s actually going on and what helps.

The velcro cat

Many cats spend the first days after your return glued to you: following room to room, sleeping on your chest, yelling when a door closes between you. This is straightforward — your absence was noticed, your return is being secured. It’s affectionate, it’s temporary, and the best response is to enjoy it while re-establishing normal routine. Regular feeding times and the usual play sessions tell a cat the world is back on its axis faster than any amount of fussing.

The cold shoulder

The opposite reaction — aloofness, turned backs, leaving the room as you enter — gets called “sulking”, and while cats probably don’t hold grudges the way we imagine, the behaviour is real. It’s usually a mix of disrupted routine and the sheer strangeness of you: you’ve been gone, and you’ve returned smelling of aeroplanes, hotels, sun cream and other places. Give it time, keep routines steady, let them re-approach on their terms. Most cold shoulders thaw within a couple of days.

The suitcase incident

Weeing on a suitcase, your bed, or clothes you’ve worn isn’t spite — cats don’t do revenge, however much it looks like it. It’s usually anxiety expressed through scent-mixing: your things smell intensely of you (and of elsewhere), and an unsettled cat “claims” them to restore the household smell to normal. It matters because it can also signal that the time alone was more stressful than it should have been — and occasionally it flags a medical issue (urinary problems love to announce themselves this way). One incident on homecoming day: clean thoroughly with enzymatic cleaner and move on. A pattern, or any straining or blood: vet, promptly.

Eating oddly, hiding, over-grooming

An unsettled few days is normal. But appetite that doesn’t return within a day or two, ongoing hiding, or new over-grooming (check for thinning fur on the belly and legs) suggest the stress ran deeper — our guide to stress signs in cats covers what to watch and when to involve the vet.

The real question: what was their holiday like?

Here’s the honest pattern we’ve seen over years of doing this: how a cat greets your return reflects how their time without you went. Cats left with a bowl-filling neighbour visit or shipped to a noisy cattery come home to owners who report days of sulking, hiding, or clinginess. Cats who stayed in their own territory with a daily visitor keeping routine, play, and company going tend to greet their humans like… well, like it was no big deal. Which is exactly what you want.

Some of it is unavoidable — cats do notice absence — but the quality of care in between is the lever you control. A consistent, familiar sitter turns your holiday from a disruption into a blip.

Next time, build the soft landing

Keep routine identical (same feeding times, via your sitter’s visits), leave scent anchors (your worn t-shirt in their favourite bed), skip the dramatic goodbye, and come home calm. And book care that keeps their world intact: that’s the whole case for home visits in one sentence.

If you’re in Didsbury, Chorlton, Withington or nearby and want your next return greeted with a stretch and a chirp instead of a cold shoulder — we can arrange exactly that. 🐾