​I Don't Give Up Nothing

Catherine Donley and her boyfriend, Adam Teed, have two kids together; Emma, 4 years old and Harley, 1 year old.

“I’ve been staying home since Emma was a baby,” says Donley. While the Donley-Teed family saves money on childcare, they lose the money Donley could be making if she worked. Teed works a maintenance job in local apartment buildings in their hometown of Edmore, Michigan.

Being that they are a single income family, the four of them live in a two-bedroom duplex and own one car. Emma Teed also attends the local Head Start Program, which provides free learning and developmental services to low-income families.

While most people would see this as a less than ideal lifestyle, Donley and Teed do not.

“I don’t give up nothing, really,” says Donley. Donley also says that it is not difficult for them to survive on just her boyfriend’s income and she has always wanted to be able to stay home with her kids when she had them.

Having a loving family is more important to them than money could ever be. Donley takes her kids to the park across from their house every day to play, plays with them and their toys in the living room, reads them books before bed, and rocks them to sleep when they don’t want to sleep in their own beds. Teed chases his girls around the living room, colors with them at the dining room table and works long, hard hours just for them.

When it comes to the Donley-Teed family, they don’t need a three-story house and designer clothes. They need the four of them, a roof over their house, and food on the table.
​
They need love and that’s what they have.