Karrine Steffans-McCrary: Chapter 11 of my latest best seller, "The Vixen Manual: How to Find, Seduce, & Keep the Man You Want," touches on a topic that has been on my mind a lot lately.

In a time when we are all taking a new look at our finances and spending, how important is it that both you and your man not only pull your own weight, but also have the ability to carry one another? To be even more specific, how damaging to a relationship is it when it's the woman who makes and spends the most money?

In my younger years, I believed love was impossible, therefore, it made more sense to date a man based on his income. As I grew up a bit, I realized that love is available to me, and that men with boatloads of money come equipped with the most unbearable egos! So, I chose love over money and never doubted my decision.

But recent events and conversations with friends have made me wonder: when a man is not the breadwinner, at the moment, does this not bruise his fragile male ego? And is the bruised ego of a man who can't "take care of" his wife more dangerous than the inflated ego of a man who can?

In a perfectly traditional world, husbands would provide for their families, and wives would either work for their own sense of self or stay home and raise their children, but the pressures of the world would fall exclusively on the shoulders of our men. Some of us do not live in that world.

So, can we live with one over the other when neither love nor money is all you need to stay alive? As I am finding, you kinda need both.

Karrine Steffans-McCrary is a stay-at-home mother of two. A New York Times best selling author, she is a pop culture figure who has injected her real life experiences and advice into a new generation of women and demographics commonly overlooked.