Even if you’re not a big dating show fan, there are probably few people with a Netflix subscription who don’t realize that the romantic shenanigans featured on Love Is Blind every season nab lots of attention. In Season 4, viewers have been talking about the ‘ride or die’ friendship between Bliss and Chelsea, how the latter and her fiancé, Kwame, don’t seem to have actual chemistry, and a host of other topics. A big point of conversation now is the live reunion that, well, mostly wasn’t actually live, but Irina has now opened up about her emotional moment during the taping and why she was “hurt.”
What Did Love Is Blind’s Irina Say About Being ‘Hurt’ And Emotional During The Reunion?
There have now been four cast reunions for this dating show, and I don’t know if any of them have gone off without at least one person tearing up while talking about their experiences. The Love Is Blind Season 3 reunion saw Cole positively sobbing about how he’d made his one-time fiancée, Zanab, feel, and when Entertainment Tonight spoke with Irina about her Season 4 reunion appearance, she revealed that she had a pretty emotional moment during the taping, but doesn’t think fans would have seen it:
I think there was a moment, it didn’t show, but I was literally crying when Micah was talking because I was in this moment where I said, ‘You know what, I’m just a little sad for everyone because I said we are human. Every single person sitting out there in those chairs, we are human and only trying to do our best.’ It just hurt. I felt like I was getting attacked a lot, Micah. It just hurt. And I felt like what made me sad was people wanted to see that. People wanted to see me hurt and laughed at. It was difficult to experience.
Myself and many other viewers were left in the dark during Sunday’s reunion, as technical difficulties kept the special from starting on time, and when it did, only a select few were able to actually watch. The pre-recorded episode wasn’t available at the time of this writing (it’s set to hit the streamer on April 17 at 3 p.m. EST), so, I’m not sure if those who were able to watch it live actually saw Irina cry during the proceedings, or if she’s correct that cameras didn’t catch her.
However, seeing as how many people watch this and other reality shows for the messy drama, her thought that fans wanted to see her “hurt and laughed at” does make some sense. Irina and her pod-buddy, Micah, both apologized publicly after the season began airing, when viewers complained about their mean-girl behavior toward the other women. I had many thoughts while watching the first five episodes, including whether or not my fellow viewers saw how callous the duo was when it came to others’ feelings.
Not only were they both shown laughing as other women returned from dates crying (like with one of Jackelina’s emotional moments), but Irina did a piss poor and somewhat cruel job of revealing to her fiancé, Zack, that she actually wasn’t into him once they met and were face-to-face. It all caused strong feelings from viewers, who very well might have wanted to see Irina get her comeuppance during the reunion, with members of the live studio audience actually booing her. She continued:
I just think people were really excited to see me get roasted, so the server got backed up. They got what they wanted. I think I, a little bit, deserved it, and I hope people felt the peace they wanted to feel.
The reality star admitted that having her behavior on TV and then sitting through the reunion was “pretty tough,” she seems resolved to “work on myself” amid the backlash, and noted that she’s “not going to let these three weeks filmed in my life define the rest of my life.” Here’s hoping that she really does learn from the backlash and continue to grow.