'My boyfriend and I have vanilla sex, and we're perfectly satisfied.'

My boyfriend and I have vanilla sex, and you know what? I like that flavour.

Figuratively (and in some instances literally), we’ve tried to add sprinkles, chocolate syrup and whipped cream, but we always go to the basics to finish.

Don’t get me wrong, these add-ons can be fun, interesting, usually funny, sometimes awkward. But they never have the same impact as vanilla. They’re never our flavor.

Maybe we’re just doing it wrong. Maybe the readers of ‘Cosmo’ are more flexible than we are. Or maybe we’re lucky we’ve acknowledged that vanilla is our special flavour. At least in bed.

Outside of the bedroom, we’re wide open to experimenting. We’ll try moshing to ‘Municipal Waste’ with sneakers at eye level as someone crowd surfs. We’re open to eating goat and octopus and even bugs. We’re open to swinging 30 feet in the air only to drop into water from a rope swing. But in our intimate moments? We always choose vanilla.

I feel like people - typically women - always feel so anxious about sex. Like it's a performance, and in order for anyone to have a good time you have to entertain a viewer.

Now, I don't know about you, but most of us aren't on screens when we're lying in bed. (Not that there's anything wrong with that, if that's your choice.) The reality is, most of us are at home in PJs at the end of a long day, just looking for a connection. When we start to feel anxious that our sex life is 'in a rut' or more about 'boreplay' than 'foreplay,' we instantly lose that connection.

I think about it like sports. Sure, outside of the game you can try different tactics and in these moments it's okay to mess up, but if time and time again you realise kicking the ball that one way just isn't working, you don't keep trying. You go with what works.

Sex is the same. That doesn't mean it's boring. It means it's reliable. It's familiar. It's not intimidating.

Ever since I was young, I always had this impression that once you get older, you would lose your sex life. This was before I even had one! We've been fed this lie and thus we start to believe it before we even understand what sex is.

What kind of encouragement is that to expect that your sex life will eventually die years before you do? Especially when we're surrounded by sex every day.

Ultimately, sex is more than toys, more than role-playing, more than awkward positions that might make you go 'oh' in a entirely different sort of way. That doesn't mean one shouldn't experiment. It just means that that sex isn't the only area in life that needs new excitement all the time.

Sex is about being comfortable and knowing you can get to the finish line by reliable and comfortable tactics. And hey, there's nothing wrong with vanilla. After all, it's pretty much in everything!