Kink Is My Sexual Orientation—Here’s Why Vanilla Sex Doesn’t Turn Me On

With Bonavega

For many of us in the kink world, being kinky isn’t just a bedroom hobby or a set of toys tucked away in a drawer. It’s not a phase, a costume, or a performance for someone else’s pleasure. It’s not even a preference—at least not in the casual way that word gets used. It’s an orientation.

I view my kinkiness as an orientation because 99% of the time I enjoy sex that is kinky. I find vanilla sex almost totally uninteresting. I also view kink as an orientation because kink is play, and I play with the major of the people I engage sexually with and very infrequently desire what would be considered traditional or vanilla sex. Kinky play is a way of expressing my creativity and dominant personality and it’s my way of life.

But what exactly is kink?

Kink refers to any consensual erotic expression that departs from traditional or “vanilla” sex. It’s a broad umbrella that includes power exchange (like Domme/sub dynamics), bondage, impact play, roleplay, sensory exploration, ritual, and more. Kink is about intentional, imaginative, and often psychological forms of connection—it’s not always about sex in the conventional sense. It can be theatrical, meditative, primal, spiritual, or silly. Kink is play, and play is sacred.

People often ask me if I “play” Sophia Domina, as if she’s a uniform I strap on to seduce or entertain. No. Sophia is my integrated personality as a kinky adult who still plays like the bossy Sicilian girl of 12 in my bohemian backyard. I freed myself of sexual shame and allowed my creativity to flow in my sexual relationships. I am free of gender constraints, slut shaming, and the male gaze when it comes to how I express myself sexually. Sometimes I do things completely out of order according to the bases. Sometimes I skip the bases altogether.

Kink gave me that freedom.

Kink is not about checking boxes on a list of sexual acts. It’s about tuning in to what feels good, what excites the nervous system, what speaks to our authentic selves. It’s about mutual curiosity, negotiation, consent, and the thrill of pushing edges in a conscious, connected way.

And that orientation—toward power exchange, ritual, and erotic imagination—is what led me to create the Boudoir Soirée, a curated, inclusive play party for all genders and orientations where kink and connection are prioritized over penetrative sex or racking up a body count. The Soirée isn’t about finishing—it’s about feeling. About being witnessed, celebrated, and allowed to explore the edges of who you are.

When I’m with someone who isn’t kinky, I’m truly bored after a short time. It’s like trying to speak a foreign language without fluency—something essential is lost in translation. I can do it, but I don’t thrive there. There’s no spark. No tension. No thrill. Just the mechanics of sex without the alchemy of kink.

Kink is my mother tongue.

We need to expand the idea of sexual orientation to include how we love, how we fuck, and how we play. Not just who we’re attracted to, but the style of erotic connection that makes us feel most alive.

For some of us, that style is deeply, unavoidably kinky. It’s not a phase. It’s not a costume. It’s who we are.