Is it normal for a confident cat to hide again after moving?
Completely. A move erases the scent-map that told her the place was safe, so even a bold cat resets to caution. It isn't a step backward in your bond — it's her being sensible in a home that just went unfamiliar.
A cat’s confidence isn’t a fixed personality trait you can bank — a lot of it is really familiarity. She’s bold at home because she owns the map: every corner she’s marked, every route she’s walked. A move wipes that map clean overnight, and the same cat who ruled the old place now finds herself somewhere with no safe landmarks at all. Her own scent is what marks territory as safe, which is why relocating her scratchers and bedding rebuilds the map faster than anything you can buy (Galaxy, Total Cat Mojo, ch.8; Bradshaw & Ellis, The Trainable Cat, ch.3). Retreating is the smart move, not a personality change.
Give it a little time and the right setup and her old confidence comes back with the map — usually right where you left it. The closest measured timeline is a boarding-cattery study — not a move into a permanent home, but the nearest thing anyone has tested: about two in three cats settled into an unfamiliar place within two weeks, and one in three took longer. If she’s the one in three, that’s not a step backward, that’s her pace.
Full walk-through: my cat is hiding since we moved.
Behaviour and wellbeing only. Nothing here diagnoses or replaces a veterinarian — if something about your cat worries you physically, that’s a call to your vet.
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The everyday moments and the behaviour questions — and first word on what we make, offers included. From Deni & Helen.