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Hey, guys. Are you ready for some money rehab?

Wall Street has been completely upended by an unlikely player, Gamestop.

And should I have a 401k? Because then I- You don't do it? No, I never- You think the whole world revolves around you and your money? Well, it doesn't. I got charged for wasting our time. I will take a check.

I got to take a check with a full-school check. You recognize her from anchoring on CNN, CNBC, and Bloomberg. The only financial expert you don't need a dictionary to understand. Nicole Lappin.

I don't want to give away any spoilers. So all I'll say is that I had a bizarre experience that I was looking to decode. And the person who is best suited to decode said experience audience is my friend who is a sex therapist, Emily Morse. Are you intrigued? Well, let's get into it. Emily, I am so happy to say this. Welcome to Money Rehab.

So good to be here. Thank you for having me. Congrats on your show and all the success.

Thank you. Thank you. Well, I feel like I've been on your show, and so it's nice to have you come on mine and welcome you into my digital home. On the show, of course, you know that we're really interested in money, but of course, how money intersects with all the things. It's politics, relationships, psychology, everything. A few weeks ago, we had a Sugar Baby on the podcast to talk about the economics of sugaring, and that really got us interested in the intersection of sex and money. So you are the perfect person to do the sex part because that's not my jam. I mean, it is, but not my expert jam. So when my producers and I were talking about this, I told them that I had someone reach out to me asking me to be their fin dom, and my producers had never heard of that term before. So as a sex therapist and overall sexpert, can you give us the definition?

Yeah. I mean, fin dom essentially is... Think about like BDSM. A lot of people know what that is, power play, dominant submissive play. So fin dom is financial domination, where the sub is somebody who is looking for, in many cases, it's a man in this world, where they're looking for someone to dominate them financially, meaning they control their finances. They do a budget for them. So instead of using ropes or ties or blindfolds, the money becomes the factor that they are dominating with it.

So this guy reached out to me saying he just wanted to put $10,000 in my PayPal account, which is different in nature than some of the other weirdos I've received emails from. We've all received some weirdo emails. So the ladies in my office said, Can I take the $10,000? And I was like, Listen, I don't want anything to do with this. So if you want to reach out, then go for it. And at that point, I started getting interested by this. This was legit. This guy wanted to just give me $10,000. He said, No strings attached whatsoever. And as we explored it, I was fascinated by this psychology. So as a sex expert, what is the psychology behind someone who's seeking out a financial dominant?

Well, first, I want to say you'd probably be really good at being a fin dom because you'd be really great at setting their budgets and telling them how they can spend their money and how they can't spend their money. So they probably would... You would be a natural if you ever decided to get into it. But if you think about financial debt, it's a fetish lifestyle, like we're saying. It's dominant, submissive played. But the reason why it's so arousing is because, and there's a few factors, it's the surrendering of power. It's saying, You're going to dominate me. That's the arousing part. And usually I don't speak in genders, but we're just going to say here that it is typically men who do this. I'm just going to say that men who are told from a young age, we're supposed to be the breadwinners. We have the money, we care for everything. And then there's something very arousing about the flip side of that. We measure our worth with money. And then to say, I'm going to weaponize my money, and I'm going to use it as something that's kinky, and then create this intimacy in a way with somebody who is...

We're giving up our powers. We're giving up our control to somebody. For many people, the reason why they access something, we'll do something like BDSM or bondage. People know what BDSM is, or power play, is because we are in an exchange with somebody and we're able to access a part of our emotions that we're not able to otherwise. So there's the adrenaline rush. There's a lot that happens when we are giving up control of something. And even though we know it's wrong, we're fetishizing our money. So there's an addiction that some of these people can have over this self-destructive behavior of giving up their money.

Yeah, I looked this person up because I thought, wait a minute, this guy just has 10 grand to casually throw into my PayPal account. Who is he? He must have a lot of money. But no, he didn't have a lot of money. I looked him up. He was in this random town. It didn't look like the guy had 10 grand to be just giving to me. And so it was a lot of money to him, which is not initially what I thought. I thought he was just flush with cash. Not the case. And there was no sexy stuff involved. So the arousal didn't come from ever, what, meeting me?

The thing is, in most of these cases with fin doms and the sub, there's no meeting. They don't ever meet. It's almost like a self-induced psychological torture. And I think that a lot of fin doms get into this because the fin doms or the fin subs, it's due to low self-esteem, inability to deal with in their normal life, about rejection, humiliation. It's almost like cuckolding, which is another thing that we talk about when a Men have this fantasy of seeing their wife have sex or their partner have sex with somebody else. It's almost like something happens. This is like the understanding of arousal in this moment. The shame and the humiliation flips itself and it actually becomes arousing and a turn on. The moment he's, Where are you the PayPal money? He's like, That is a turn on. I've just done this exchange that's penetrating into my deep psyche, and it's arousing. So to me, for many, it can be an addiction because a lot of times they'll do that and then they feel a regret after if it's an adrenaline and a high and a low. But for some men, because again, nothing here is so black and white.

For some, it's an arousal. They have enough money to do it. They make sure they don't get into too hot water. Like, they're not declaring bankruptcy, but they're in this relationship where it's the psychological arousal of feeling humiliated and feeling submissive. Maybe every other area in their life, these men are dominating. They have high power jobs. They're at home with their wives. They're doing all of these things in their life where they're in control. And if they can create a situation with just pretty low stakes in the sense of they're not going to get an STI or an SDD, it's not really cheating, although in some places it can be, but it's a psychological exchange that goes on online where they are feeling this deep arousal.

Got you. So no, thank you for clarifying, and thank you for going there to the actual what happens with the physical arousal, because I was wondering if he's transferring PayPal money to me. Is he literally getting hard or having an orgasm? Or how is that? I can't imagine that being pleasurable, but I suppose it is.

The thing, it's a kink. Many of us have kinks. We're into voyeurism, or we want to watch people have sex outside, or we really are kinky. We like wearing certain things in the bedroom, or we like to think certain thoughts to get us turned on. And so financial domination isn't even really transactional, which is funny to think. It's that is the kink. So the arousal is the act of them sending the money, but they're not expecting anything from you in return. But it's not that any woman could just... It's not just a woman saying, You better give me money, or, You're an asshole. There's a whole art to the form of being a dom, being a fin dom, being the dominant part of this.

What is the art for it? Because I'm sure some women are listening like- I want to do it. Wait a minute. What's the fucking catch here? I want 10 grand in my Does that count for not ever meeting somebody?

It's a little bit of acting. You know how to escalate. You know how to do the power play. You're only going to give me 100 now. I know you have more than that. Give me a thousand. You understand the psychology. Maybe you probably need some really great improv. And if you are a phone sex operator and you have taken some improv classes or you knew something about money, that might be the great trifecta there of you being an expert in it. But it is a practice It's just like anything else. I think it's about understanding psychology, understanding the levels of what's going to get somebody to... And being able to go through the motions. If you have fear, you're like, Give me $1,000. And the guy says, No, you're like, Okay. But you have to keep playing with them. You have to keep messing with them. And you have to be able to insult somebody. You have to be able to literally dominate them and say, You're just a... You're whatever you would say. I don't know. How much do you want me to swear? You're a pussy.

Go for it. You're a piece of It's not a shit. Give me more money, you asshole.

I don't know. I'm going to miss you're an asshole. Give me money. It could be bribing. If you don't give me money, I'm going to tell your wife. I'm going to tell your kids. I'm going to tell your family.

I'm going to- Oh, so some casual extortion, too.

It is extortion, but it's extortion that is consensual. It's consensual extortion.

Hold on to your wallets, boys and girls. Money Rehab will be right back.

Summer vacations and going to the beach and having the hot girl or guy summer of your dreams, this season can be a little hard on our wallets. A Chime Checking account helps you reach your financial goals while still enjoying the summer. You can take back your finances with features like fee-free overdraft up to $200 with SpotMe or getting paid up to two days early with direct deposit. Learn more at chime. Com/mnn. And you know I hate overdrafted fees. One time, I overdrafted buying a latte, which was so embarrassing at the time, but hey, it happens to the of us. And I got charged 35 bucks for a $7 latte. But Chime allows you to overdraft up to $200 with no fees, and you can get temporarily increased overdraft limits with boosts from friends. Live it up this summer and make progress toward your financial goals with Chime. Open your account in minutes at chime. Com/mnn. That's chime. Com/mnn. Chime. Feels like progress. Banking services and debit card provided by the Bancorp Bank NA or Stride Bank NA. Members FDIC. Spotme eligibility requirements and overdraft limits apply. Boots are available to eligible Chime members enrolled in SpotMe and are subject to monthly limits.

Terms and conditions apply. Go to chime. Com/disclosures for details.

Now for some more money rehab. So have you spoken to women who are just financial dominance, or are there women who are general dominance who do all of the domination?

I've spoken to all of them. There's dominatrix. There are women who are just financial dominance, and especially during the pandemic, when no one could leave their house anyway, we saw a rise in fin-doms. We saw a rise in people being able to do this across all platforms. It became more where you thought it was a little bit more private or you had to have a secretive account, or you didn't want anyone to know. Now they have full on Twitter accounts, Instagram, maybe not Instagram because they're more restrictive about this stuff. But yeah, they have full on profiles and they're open about it. And the difference is that I think with a lot of dominant matrixes, just a regular you probably would see them in person. It's the picture we have with the woman in the leather boots and the whips and humiliating. In either way, they're still humiliating their subjects for whatever. It could be with pain, it could be with spanking or pain or ropes or chains, or it could be with emptying their bank account.

Getting the access to the bank account, that's part of this. Giving over your passwords.

That's the part of the loss of control, too. It It's almost like if someone said to you, Could you imagine ever giving up your password? But it's such this moment of deep, of like, I can't believe I'm doing this. It's like a thrill. It's a dream. Think of the things that you've done that are so adrenaline-seeking, things that you For some people, it's like jumping off a bridge, or it's skydiving, or it's taking risks, getting up in public speaking. But for these people, for these people that engage in this, it's literally like, I can't believe I'm doing this. I'm giving up my passwords. I'm giving up the most part. My life could be ruined. And yet at the point of doing it, I'm so aroused. It's literally that intersection of, holy shit, I'm giving some of my money to I did it. And that turn on, they get turned on, they get aroused. It's addictive, and they can't stop doing it.

So what advice would you give someone to make sure that they're structuring this relationship to be safe and healthy? Having safe words, maybe that whole, I'm thinking of the scene in 50 Shades with the contract. I mean, do you even go that far?

I would say if you're getting into a relationship with somebody like this and you're giving them all of your passwords, all of your money, that you absolutely should have a contract. You should have a safe word. I mean, otherwise this could go get really bad really fast. So I'm assuming that, yes, have a contract, have rules of engagement, check in often.

We also talked on the show about sugaring. I didn't even know that that was a verb or a gerund or whatever you call it. We spoke with a woman who calls herself a sugar babe, which is also new terminology to me because I've only heard this sugar baby idea. And when we spoke with her, she said that she considered herself in a relationship with her sugar daddies, and she's only dated sugar daddies, no other guys. Is that the norm?

That really surprised me. There is no norm here with that. I mean, I think that sugar daddies, she's not dating anyone else. And And she's just dating them.

Well, it depends what she- Yeah, she calls them her boyfriends.

Well, maybe she's got some intimacy, some intimacy challenges where she's not really looking for a deep emotional connection. And to have a man who's taking care of her, all of her needs financially might just be enough. But I also know some people who are sugar daddy, sugar babies, and they have a sugar daddy, and they actually have a boyfriend at home, and they just have an arrangement with the sugar daddy who pays their rent every month or who buys them school supplies or whatever for college or whatever else they need. So I think that in these arrangements, the main thing is that it's the dominance. There's someone in control and there's someone submissive, and money is the same. Money is the factor. So I would say that you could call me your boyfriend, you You could just say you're your sugar daddy. You could not tell. I know people who do it, they don't tell any of their friends. They don't even tell their boyfriend sometimes. I don't advise that. But I think that it's a way that for some men who are in this role, maybe they never had a daughter or maybe Maybe they had a strained relationship with their daughter, and they felt that there's some healing thing in here, but they also find this person attractive.

For some women, maybe they have a father-ish father challenge, where they find that hot to be taken care of. It really is This is where it's a transactional consensual relationship where you have a contract. This is what it's about. You're going to pay my rent. I'm going to go to the movies with you once a week. I think that every single one of these relationships, I think the main factor is that there's money involved and there's somebody taking the money. But in the healthiest ones, you really have to walk through what's our contract, what's our deliverables, what can we expect? And for some, there's no emotions. For some, there's no sex. For some, it's just transactional. So I think people have to understand, you get to decide. If you go in this relationship, you get to decide what you want, the Wild West.

And all of it's unique, as you say, everything is individual. I have been really surprised, though, the more I've looked into sugaring and the economics of sugaring and who these women and who these men are, or every permutation in between, that a lot of these women are like boss bitches, lawyers or executives or who want to be sugar babies.

What? It feels really good to be taken care of sometimes. It feels good to be in that submissive role where you feel that... Listen, it's the same thing for some of these men. If you're a boss bitch and you're out there every day, you're running your company, you're running your business, you got a lot going on, and there's somebody who's going to take care of even if you don't need the money, but it's somebody just doting on you or they are just showing up for you in ways that other people in your life aren't. And you get to be submissive, you get to relax for a minute and be like, Okay, babe, you got this? Amazing. That makes a lot of sense. I mean, I'm more submissive, too. In my life, being the boss and doing all the things, I'm dominant. But you get me in the bedroom, I'm like, I'm out. I'm doing this all day. I'm active. Don't get me wrong, but I don't want to necessarily take control. I can tell you what's going to happen and what we should probably do, but then you can take the lead on it. And I think that's really common, that we don't usually go through life in the same state all the time.

And especially when it comes to sex, sometimes there's this switch.

Yeah, you and I have talked about this in the past and totally, I couldn't agree with you more. I obviously am a boss bitch. I've wrote the book Boss Bitch. And yet I want to really be in that feminine energy in my romantic relationship. I don't want to pay on a first date. I don't even want to look. I don't want to see the check. And that's just my choice. It doesn't mean I can't pay for it. I can. I could pay for all the meals in the whole restaurant. I could probably pay for the restaurant. But that's my choice. And I don't care what other women want to do. That's your prerogative. I think being the ultimate feminist is not telling other women what to do. You do you, girl. But as a sex therapist, what are some of the other common issues you see money play in relationships?

Money is probably one of the hugest factors. I would say money and kids and sex are three of the main factors that most couples have challenges around. And for money, it's because we're not completely honest. Sometimes we don't disclose if we have debt, we don't disclose what We want our aspirations financially. We have different views on how we each want to spend our money, and we don't talk about this before we get married and commingle our finances. I think it also goes back to your family of origin. If you grew up in a home where money was tight and If your parents were much more restrictive, and then you're with somebody who's a big spender, and they're always spending money flippantly, and you become a saver, there's all these conflicts in the way that we handle money. So I think it's being raised with different values around money. When you get into a relationship with somebody and we don't often talk about these things before we get married, which is crazy, or get into a relationship, that can really be a problem if you have different views. Like your partner's splurging on a new car and you're like, But we still need to put away money for the kid's education.

We haven't talked about any of this. So I always recommend to couples that these are the things that you need to clear before you move in together. What are our values towards money? What do we value? Do we want to save? Do we want to spend? Do we want to spend on vacation? Some couples say, We just want to spend on experiences, but not on things. It's just really our values around money.

What recommendations do you have for couples who need to talk about money issues, especially if they're nervous, which most of them are.

I think that you could use my three T's conversation. It's an awkward conversation, timing, tone, and turf. You want to have the conversation at the right time. It's not when you're hungry, and angry, and lonely, and tired, and pissed at your partner. You want to do it when it's... So the timing is when you're casual, you're hanging out, and your tone is light and curious. Let's talk about money. I realized we've never really had a real conversation about money. And the turf is somewhere like not when you're sitting down at the kitchen table with your money spread out and you're about to. It's really when you are like, and I say, I want to talk about our financial situation because I realized that lately, I know there's some debt. We haven't really talked about it. And I'm feeling like I would really like I have a growth mindset around money and around connecting with you about money. This is not something I've had before. And would you be willing to go on a journey with me to figure out the healthiest ways for us to be together and have healthy finances as well?

For today's tip, you can take straight to the bank. We've been enjoying reports on money topics that live at the intersection of other disciplines and don't get a lot of attention, like money and sex, money in politics, money in relationships, social justice, and many more. If there are any topics that you want to learn more about, DM me on Instagram at MoneyRehabShow or email us at moneyrehab@nicollappin.

Com.

Money Rehab is a production of iHeartRadio. I'm your host, Nicole Lappin. Our producers are Morgan Lavoy and Mike Coscarelli.

Executive producers are Nikki Etor and Will Pearson.

Our mascots are Penny and Mimsy. Huge thanks to Ogie Money Rehabit team, Michelle Lanz for her development work, Katherine Law for her production and writing, Magic, and Brandon Dickert for his editing, engineering, and sound design. And as always, thanks to you for finally investing in yourself so that you can get it together and get it all.

You spend my money, money, money. You spend.