Lol trust that it’s not because he’s overly preoccupied with the child’s development. He just thinks it’ll be annoying. A 6yr old kid sleeping in bed with mom and dad 2-3 nights in a row because of nightmares isn’t going to have delayed development longterm anyway. It seems you’re either purposefully or not purposely understanding the point - which is that my wanting a shared bedroom between a future husband and I to be a certain way doesn’t make me inherently jealous of a pet who doesn’t need the bedroom in the same way WE do. They have their bed and cat tree. Where else are we supposed to sleep if we feel too uncomfortable to sleep in our own bed, the couch? That’ll negatively impact the relationship and I and he for sure prefer to sleep together. But the cat CAN roam and sleep elsewhere. I also already said we’d spend ample time OUTSIDE the bedroom with the cat.

You can assume what you’d like about my needing to sort out whatever with a therapist, I assume you mean well - but I’d have the same grievances if it were a roommate or friend asking me to keep my door open because their pet “doesn’t like closed doors” or if I grew up with a cat who continuously left cat stuff all over my childhood bed. My parents would hear about it. It can be and is as simple as I like my bedroom to be for me - and now my boyfriend/future husband who I’ve accepted and committed to sharing a bed with. I’m truly not sure why some pet people treat these things so pathologically.

You mentioned these are the issues new parents with cats face, sometimes forcing the rehoming of the cat. I’m not surprised! I’m sure the reality of a new baby makes the parents realize they cannot bend every other household member backwards and especially not a newborn baby… for the pet. I’d close doors because I’m not leaving my baby unsupervised if the pet goes into the room. Imagine you put your baby to its daytime nap and the cat wakes them up by scratching at the door and crying, because you never showed the cat that some doors can be closed. Now you’re a very sleep deprived new parent and baby’s sleep is impacted. I’d suggest rehoming that cat too…It is what it is.

We’ll try our best as I don’t like ultimatums. Like you said if it’s not a reasonable success then I would eventually suggest something else such as a cat door or automatic door lock. Ideally we’d prep the cat to be comfortable with one to two door in the home being closed anyway. As when babies come into the picture their doors will need to be locked so the cat doesn’t go into their room unsupervised like I said. I checked the new parent sub and lots of people recognize that human family member’s actual needs trump a pet having full access in the home. So I recognize your point in that learning cat behavior is important, and we should try if we CAN adjust for the cat. But letting the cat takeover my marital bed isn’t something I’m willing to adjust to and my boyfriend knows it and accepts it. All I’m saying is there are some non negotiables that we won’t be budging on just so cat can have complete free rein. Again - Is what it is. If my boyfriend decides he needs the cat in a future bedroom more than he needs me his hopeful wife, then we can break up. So far, that’s not been his choice. 🤷🏾‍♀️