"Let no one ever come to you without leaving better and happier. Be the living expression of God's kindness; kindness in your face, kindness in your eyes, kindness in your smile, kindness in your warm greeting."
Mother Teresa
Cancer stripped her of everything including her life but it could not steal away God's LOVE, PEACE and the JOY that radiated through her. Korrine never stopped SMILING!
Korrine Lannie Croghan
Korrine Croghan was a vivacious 14-year-old girl who lived all of her life in Livermore, CA. She had a love for animals, sports, and most of all, family. Korrine was a straight “A” student while attending Mendenhall Middle School and was working hard in her first trimester at Granada High. She was a great friend to many and was everything that a brother, mother and father could ask for in a daughter. Korrine was the type of girl who would greet you with a wide smile and look into your eyes and truly would want to know how you were doing
Korrine & Cancer
On December 20th, 2007, Korrine was diagnosed with Choriocarcinoma with a germ cell element. Choriocarcinoma is a very rare type of cancer in teenage girls and inflicts less than 200 nationwide each year. Although the cancer started in her left ovary, the cancer had spread to her right ovary, lungs and liver. After the removal of a cantaloupe sized tumor in her left ovary on December 21st of 2007, Korrine, endured 10 months of intense chemotherapy designed for adult men.
During the course of her treatment, Korrine suffered many complications. In early April of 2007, her liver began to bleed. After staying at Kaiser Oakland for almost two weeks, Korrine was transfered to UCSF and spent a month in the intensive care unit. The doctors at UCSF Medical Center were finally able to stop her bleeding liver, but, not before it filled her abdomen with 5 liters of blood that had to be drained via a tube inserted into her stomach. On top of that, both of Korrines’ lungs collapsed while undergoing a CT scan that almost took her life. Because of that, 2 liters of fluid needed to be drained off of her lungs with the use of another drainage tube. Throughout her treatment Korrine needed numerous blood and platelet transfusions. She had nosebleeds that lasted an hour on several occasions. At one point, she had 18 intravenous tubes running through her body filled with anti-bacterials, anti-fungals, nutrition, painkillers and chemotherapy. Korrine miraculously made it through those tough days at UCSF and returned to Kaiser Hospital in Oakland. She was finally stable and was released to go home in late June. Just as things were starting to look up for her, she suffered septic shock in July that forced her to go back into intensive care at Kaiser in Santa Clara for 2 weeks.
Korrine returned home in late July and went through imaging scans to see if the cancer had disappeared. The scans always came back good, but not great. In an effort to kill and stop the remaining cancer cells, she underwent an emergency round of chemotherapy in early September. Unfortunately, it did kill the remaining cancer and her doctors had run out of options.
Korrine spent her last days at home with her family reading books and loving on her cats and dog. She passed away quietly, at home, on October 27th, 2008. Through it all, Korrine had a positive attitude and never gave up or complained. Many consider Korrine a hero.
Team KC
The Team KC website was originally started as a way to encourage, educate, raise awareness, and keep friends and family informed with accurate information on Korrine's treatment and progress. Family, classmates, friends, community members, and complete strangers rallied to support Korrine and her family through her fight against Choriocarcinoma. We were amazed by the amount of support we received, and it is now our desire to give back. In March, 2009, Team KC became an official nonprofit by joining forces with Kaiser Foundation Hospital. All monies raised by Team KC will directly benefit pediatric cancer patients and their families. All monetary contributions are tax deductible.
Our Mission: To help improve the quality of life of pediatric cancer patients and their families. We wish to supply children with fun activities, toys and anything else that will brighten and better their lives. Monies will also be used to help parents pay for bills and defray the costs of gas, food and lodging that go along with caring for a child with cancer.
Stay Positive, LIVESTRONG & Welcome to Team KC!
*This is the official Team KC website and the only website approved by the Croghan family. Please do not use content, images, or video from this site without permission. This is an effort to respect the family's privacy and ensure that all content is accurate and approved. Thank you for your cooperation.
A Note From Korrine (written after her 4th round of Chemo)...
Hello everyone! It's me, Korrine. I just wanted to take a
moment to thank each and every one of you for supporting me through emails,
visits, food, gifts, and most importantly, prayer. Without it, I probably
wouldn't have made it this far. Anyways, on a happier note, I am happy to
announce that I am feeling very good. This last round of chemo hit me pretty
hard, but I think that it is more exiting to end things with a big BANG! I will
try to start writing things for the blog now that my chemo therapy is over, but
until then, just know that I love every single one of you and I am always
thinking about my family, friends, and even the people who I've never met
before. Thanks for joining my battle and for making this experience "The
Experience of a Lifetime." LIVESTRONG! And stay positive.
Korrine Lannie Croghan
February 15,
2013
It has been
four years since Korrine has passed away.
With God ALL Things Are Possible.
It is possible to continue on after the death of a child, your first
born daughter, the daughter you always wanted, the daughter you loved beyond
words and looked forward to watching her grow up. The irony of it is that Life
Does not slow down for a minute; it continues to go on and does not stop for
anyone under any circumstance. This
indeed has been tough. There are good
weeks and bad weeks, Good days and bad days.
At any moment something can remind you of her and tears begin to roll
uncontrollably. But in the midst of all
this, Life is good, God’s Grace and Love abound He strengthens us and fills us
with the Joy that passes all understanding but the hole in our hearts will
forever be until we reunite in Heaven.
Matt
continues to teach Middle School and has been teaching now for going on 25
years. Matt is greatly loved by the staff and kids. Matt has since gotten his master’s degree in
Kinesiology from Saint Mary’s in Moraga.
Matt continues to coach the LARPD LAZERS Water Polo Team and has taken
his team to the Junior Olympics and Winterfest tournaments in LA. He continues to make jelly, swim, and camp,
ride bike, hike and loves to cook. Matt
is a great dad, husband, friend and family member.
Sean is such
a sweetheart. He is now taller than the
two of us and is currently in the 7th grade. Sean continues his love of riding horses,
swimming swim team and playing water polo as the hole set. Sean has cannon for
an arm and at a recent game in LA he got 10 of the 13 goals scored. He continues to be on the principals honor
roll and has recently worked on a History Day Project that made it to the
county judging and then possibly to the State.
He is wise beyond his years, kind, caring, humble and such a delightful young man. Of
course he misses Korrine but Sean also knows she is in heaven happy and healthy
and completely healed of her cancer and he will see her again someday. Sean’s greatest love is his 1 ½ year old
black lab named lucky. Sean has
completely taken ownership of Lucky and has done all the training; Lucky loves
to play fetch, swim, hike and cuddle.
Lucky has been a great addition to our family and has soothed the pain
of losing Korrine for all of us.
As for me I
love my boys Matt and Sean more than anything, I enjoy spending my time with
them. I continue to work part time for
LARPD Aquatics which I love and love the kids I work with. I have been with
them for 10 years now. I am the Aquatics
Office Manager for both pools and still love to teach swim lessons, lifeguard
when I’m needed, teach water exercise and of course swim. I love home, being
outdoors, church and horseback riding and I have regained my love of cooking.
Team KC
continues to give us our greatest healing.
It is in giving back and doing for others that continue to be healing to
our souls. It is Korrine’s dream and we will continue on for as long as
possible. We continue with our two Team
KC blood drives a year, the Team KC Picnic for Kaiser Pediatric Oncology
patients and families and we give out the Korrine Croghan scholarship at the high school and the Korrine Croghan Kindness award at the middle school and of course our
one and only fundraiser Swim STRONG. I
am currently in the process of putting together our first annual Team KC Mom’s
picnic on April 14th along with The Taylor Family Foundation. This is
an opportunity for us to love and nourish moms as caregivers and mothers who
have lost a child. This has been one of
my dreams and now it is becoming a reality.
We continue to support Kaiser Pediatric Oncology’s children and families
in many various ways throughout the year and serve on the board of directors
for the KC East Bay Family House Foundation.
You may ask
why I am writing all of this. It is my
hope to offer some encouragement, to let you know that giving up is not an
option and that life does go on and we learn to deal as best we can with
tragedy. I also have a son and a husband
and they deserve my best and it’s not easy and a struggle at times but we must
go on and God gives us the strength to do this.
We love our community and want to give back to those who have given so
much including Korrine who’s cancer took away her life at the tender age of 14
and now we want to give her and each other our best and continue helping others
in any way we can isn’t that what life is about after all?
Sincerely,
Dana Croghan
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