Questions regarding taming new Syrian Hamster

[Inca]

Hello Hamster Central,

I'm new in this forum. Nice to meet you all! Almost 2 weeks ago I got a Syrian hamster. I let him settle in for the first week, as I saw that being recommended a lot on the internet. I did sit next to his cage and talked to him softly to make him get used to my voice.

After the first week, I started trying to get my hamster to eat treats from my hand. As expected, he didn't immediately go for it, but after a day or 2, he finally did take sunflowers seeds from between my fingertips. I practiced this a lot with him as I was excited that he seemed to warm up to me. That day he took every sunflower seed I sent his way from my fingers.

The day after however, he didn't want to take treats from my hand anymore. I did the exact same thing with the exact same treat, a sunflower seed. Every time I try to give him a sunflower seed he sniffs my hand and then jerks back slightly every single time. He does, however, take the sunflower seed when I lay it down in his bedding, so it's not as if he doesn't want the treat.

I really don't know why he's suddenly more reluctant than before when I really haven't scared him or betrayed his trust in any way. It's very demotivating for me, as I thought I was making progress in getting him to trust me.

I should add that until now I haven't washed my hands with soap while trying to feed him until now, I've just washed my hands with water and nothing else before trying to interact with him. Could it be that he doesn't recognize my smell or something?

Is this normal behavior for hamsters? Is there something I'm overlooking? Or am I jumping the gun too quickly? I'd really like to make progress in getting my hamster to trust me and I'm afraid that if I do it wrong now it'll only get more difficult as time goes on

Really hope anyone here can help me! Thanks in advance