Yes, I watch this show. I started watching it at the recommendation of a friend while in Zurich and I just finished binge watching season 4.
Fair warning, there are spoilers ahead. If you haven’t watched it, but plan on watching it….turn back now my friends. If you’ve watched it already and want to hear what I’ve got to say, read on. I’m also gonna throw a shit ton of terms at you that you may not know the meaning of so I will try to link out to stuff you can read about these words.
I have to tell ya, as a pansexual polyamorous occasional unicorn myself, this show is quite the whirlwind of fucked up emotions – but mostly accurate when it comes to Izzy’s character.
This show has made me angry, happy, sad, frustrated and pretty much runs the gambit of all my pisces emotions really.
A quick synopsis of this show – Married straight male/bi-sexual female couple seeks female unicorn (a unicorn is a bisexual female who has sex with couples) to spice up their sex life. They fall in love with said unicorn. They become a closed triad (meaning the 3 individuals in the relationship only date one another an no one else outside of their group) and eventually all 3 get married to one another and decide to have a baby. Ok so that brings us to season 4.
In this season we start to really deal with the troubles of being a Unicorn and Couples Privilege. I mean, we have dealt with this since season one really BUT now those growing pains are really starting to get worse.
Izzy is painted as the outsider, because well, she is for many reasons. She’s younger, she joined last, she’s unsure about her future, she’s not the one having the children, she’s more adventurous (even a bit rebellious) etc etc.
I personally relate to Izzy. First let me say that I have never been in a closed triad, but I have been involved with couples over the past few years where I was their unicorn. However my involvement with couples is usually of a sexual nature only and the connections are usually short term – so I haven’t had to deal with even half the struggles that Izzy faces in this show being emotionally involved, but I’ve dealt with a few.
What have I had to deal with that draws me to Izzy’s character? Lemme share a few…
She’s undecided. Me. Me. Me. I’m still very much exploring my own sexuality, relationship styles and even career. I dive head first into things that interest me and sometimes I get in way over my head. I’ve felt that way recently about polyamory in general. For nearly two years I had 3 partners concurrently. Fuck have I learned a lot from that (good and bad) and now that I have taken a step back from that, I’ve been trying to figure out what I really want. I feel like Izzy has these moments in the show a lot but then gets sucked right back in with bigger choices she has to make or lose the couple forever.
Couples privilege is real. The longer established couple always takes priority over whether or not we continue to see one another. Always. That’s primarily because I am not emotionally invested in the couple and my sole purpose is friendship and pleasure. Once that starts to become a problem or starts to cause any issues with the couple, I’m out. I’m not there to fix their relationship or break it up. Izzy struggles a great deal with coping with the couples privilege in the show and I feel for her so deeply. She IS invested 100% emotionally as their wife but you can see she struggles with fitting into their mold. It’s tough to feel like the outsider.
I enjoy enhancing the sex life of others – couples or my partners. I’d say that Izzy and most unicorns do (or else why do it). Whether giving sex advice, sharing some of my own experiences/stories or helping people explore different sides of their sexuality….I’ve always enjoyed helping people in that way. I’ve taken people to sex shops to explore options, pointed them to the right resources when they’ve needed help and even expanded some of my own sexual partner’s sexual horizons while they dated me. I love that shit!
Unicorns don’t fix broken relationships. If they have in your life, you are the exception, not the rule. In the show, Izzy was brought in to fix the relationship….basically. Yikes!!!! I can’t stress this enough! If you are struggling in your relationship and you think a threesome is going to fix it, please for the love of all things holy stay the fuck away from me and every other unicorn out there. Don’t wrap up another human being in YOUR relationship problems. You are asking for a complete and utter disaster and your unicorn doesn’t deserve to be blindsided by your bullshit. It’s harsh, but it’s happened to me and I no longer tolerate this type of behavior from couples.
Sometimes being a unicorn means feeling lonely or left out, even if the couple is inclusive. This also depends on how involved I’ve been with the couple and my own current dating status. In Izzy’s case, she struggles with this a lot because they were an established couple long before she came along. She feels, often times, like she’s trying to fit into THEIR life. For me, I’m generally not too involved with my couples outside of the bedroom. Why? Because my little heart can’t take it. I fear getting attached and wanting more than the couple is willing to commit to (we see this struggle early in the show when things go from casual to relationship). At the end of the day, the couple has each other and I go home alone. But don’t feel sorry for me, I have relationships and partnerships outside of my couples play so I’m not laying in bed all on my lonesome crying my eyes out…I’m just saying these feelings happen sometimes. I pretty much never unicorn while I’m single because I don’t need a reminder of how alone I am when I go home at night.
The sex is usually awesome. Because I know you want to know…..it really is! No, I’m not sharing details about my couples because they deserve their privacy but some of my favorite sexual experiences have been with really awesome couples I’ve had the privilege of meeting. Izzy is usually the sexual champion in that relationship, giving us unicorns a good name lol. After all, we are a highly sought after mythical creature.
I could probably continue to drone on and on but I’ll conclude here because this post is getting entirely too long.
So yea, there you have it. Another side of me probably not many people know about. Judge all you want my friends but there you have it.