I had a lovely time with Fiver this morning.

For the whole time I’ve had him (since Aug. 20 or so) he’s always been really nervous about touching. Especially his face. It took me a long time just to get him to let me give him head pets. Even then, if I touched his ears or down his cheeks or near his eyes, he’d flick his ears at me and jump, usually causing me to jump as well. He also doesn’t want you touching his back. (makes grooming a nightmare) I have to assume that he associates this with being picked up, which he refuses to have done. The face thing, well, I worry that someone must have flicked him in the face if he was ‘being naughty’. Who knows what ‘being naughty’ meant at his former home?

This morning though, right after I woke up, I found him lying as close as he could get to me in his pen. I opened the door (he usually makes a break for it but didn’t today) and reached in and he stood up rather slowly and then lay back down while I proceeded to pet his head. His little eyes eyes closed dreamily and he just sat there and let me nose rub him. And then I tried rubbing over his ears. He didn’t move at ifrst, but then he got up and shook his head and I noticed he’s kicking at that right ear quite a bit. (What is it with my bunnies and their right ears?) So I stopped for a moment and realized that, with how dry our house is, I must’ve created a lot of static electricity by rubbing his ears and it must’ve tickled horribly. He kicked at that ear on and off most of the morning as a result. Poor guy.

But when he sat back down I was able to pet his face and rub my fingers gently over the sides of his face for about a half an hour. That is epic for Fiver. He normally doesn’t want anyone touching him anywhere and this was quite an event.

I noticed, while petting him, his tummy was gurgling. I had thought maybe he was lethargic because he might have gas, but then he’d get up and kick at his ear or hop into his litter box and then come back to have more pets. What a change! I was soaking up his enjoyment of being petted I think as much as he was enjoying being petted.

He hasn’t come out to binky as much in the evenings as he used to. He seems perfectly content to have his pen door open and either rest right next to me in there on his sleeping mat or curl up on the towel outside that I use to cover the cage door with so he can come and go without catching his foot in the bars. When he does binky, he runs in and out of the cage at high speed, then tears aroung the approximately three feet of space on my blankets that is not covered by stuffed animals or me. He grooms every plushie he comes across. And now, he sits right next to me with his back facing me and bumps his little hind right up to my leg. When he first came home, he would not sit anywhere near me.

I guess I’m doing something right. Now if I could just get him to sit still while I apply cream for his heels or check his nails, etc. He still does not appreciate being picked up at all. Once you get him in your arms, he sits there and gives up and lets you hold/pet him, but I get the vibes from him that he’s tolerating it at great cost to his patience.