Kitten biting my feet and hands.

About a month ago, I adopted a sweet, two-month-old kitty named Bruno. He’s settled in quite nicely to my house and gotten comfortable with my roommates and friends, but there’s a specific behavior that’s been causing me a good deal of frustration.

Bruno is much more energetic than kittens I’ve had before (classic tuxedo cat). He gets a lot of playtime during the day between me and my two roomates, but since the day I brought him home from the shelter, Bruno gets a particularly big burst of energy between 10pm and midnight. This is right when I usually go to bed. Typically, I’ll play with him for a while and settle in for bed right afterwards.

When I’m in bed, Bruno has developed some sort of weird compulsion around biting my feet, hands, and any part of my body he has access to. I know biting is normal for kittens, but these are more than playful bites and have caused me to cry out in pain at night (ask my roomates). He’ll bite through the sheets and comforter, and sometimes make his way up to my face and hair. This is a nightly occurrence, and there have only been a handful of night this month where he’s let me sleep.

I don’t like locking him out every night and I worry that he gets lonely in the living room, so I spend about 20 minutes each night before bed trying to train him out of this habit. Most times, I’ll move him away from my body and say “no” sternly, and other times I’ll move him to the floor. Over and over, he jumps back onto the bed to continue gnawing at my skin.

I’m a bit stumped on how to change this behavior. I work long days (hybrid, so I’m often in the house with the cat) and don’t like being frustrated with my kitty when I’m tired and trying to sleep. Do I just need to be patient? Or is there something else I can be doing?