Renton community rallies around local man who died in Philippines

For Jonathan Gant’s loved ones, his recent death continues to be a “gut punch.”

While he had worked in the local music scene to help promote and market musical artists throughout the Puget Sound, traveling was very important to Gant, 40, who had planned on seeing the world with his beloved grandmother, Signola Drane, whom everyone called Sig.

“He was always reaching out to people so they could be their best self, saying, ‘You gotta just do it, life’s too short,’” said Alicia Cunningham, one of Gant’s best friends. “Jon would always keep in touch and would push me to accomplish my goals. He was that driving force behind everyone and he led by example.”

Cunningham recalled that after Sig died on Jan. 6, 2015, Gant would say that his grandmother “never got to go anywhere so I want to go everywhere.” She said that when Gant would make Instagram posts of his travels, he would caption them with a variation of “we are here,” referring to himself and Sig.

Gant had been traveling the world for several years with his and Cunningham’s other close friend, Tabarak Farah. From Paris to Japan to Thailand, the two had visited the Philippines in October for Farah’s birthday, where Gant decided to stay and live in the city of Cebu. That’s where he died on Jan. 6 — exactly 10 years after his grandmother — following a surgery to repair a tear in his heart.

“She made him promise that he would go see the world for her, so after she passed, Jon took off and began traveling and he went to Paris for her,” said Gant’s aunt, Patricia “Aunt Pat” Drane Boyd.

Medical bills and complications

On Christmas Eve, Gant was buying toys for dozens of local Cebu children when he was hospitalized for the 7.1 centimeter Type-A aortic dissection.

According to Cunningham, who grew up in Skyway with Gant and Farah, Gant had been diagnosed with Marfan syndrome when they attended Washington State University together.

According to the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases (NIAMS), Marfan syndrome is a genetic disorder that changes the proteins that help make healthy connective tissue, which affects the bones, muscles, organs and tissues in the body. Due to problems with the development of connective tissue, Marfan syndrome can lead to problems with a person’s skeleton, eyes, heart, blood vessels, skin and lungs.

Gant had an infection around his heart when they were in college, which was preceded by several other medical problems, including the need for back surgery, a collapsed lung and detached retinas.

Cunningham, who was a medical advocate for Gant throughout his adult life, said that Gant eventually had an aortic dilation and that the aortic tear had been a “twenty year worry.”

According to Cunningham, Gant’s surgery, which was time sensitive, required their friend Farah to pay $2,000 upfront to the hospital so that the blood could begin to be sourced because, according to a GoFundMe to help pay for Gant’s medical bills and other costs, the hospital did not have Gant’s blood type for his surgery.

In order to secure the blood, Gant’s friends and family took to social media to try and find people in Cebu who could donate blood for the surgery.

“We started reaching out to Filipino friends, asking if they had family or knew anyone in the Philippines who could donate,” said Cunningham, who said that everyone was working around the clock to help Gant.

”Hands around the world were reaching to find any kind of help for him,” Cunningham said. “It’s not surprising to see that so many people jumped up to help him.”

Eleven days after being hospitalized, Gant was able to go into surgery, but it was at the eleventh hour.

“The last person [to donate blood] was in the chair as they wheeled him into surgery,” said Cunningham. She explained that, since a portion of the surgery required the slowing of blood flow in order to fix the torn aorta, there was worry that Gant may develop brain damage during surgery due to the severity of the damage to his aorta and the time it took to repair it.

“However, he was fine,” she said. “He did well for the first 24 hours.”

Going into day two post-surgery, Gant’s health began to decline, and he had to be intubated again and put back on dialysis. Cunningham spoke with Gant’s doctor on the phone, who explained that he wasn’t going to make it.

“It was 3 a.m. here and I called people to let them know to say goodbye, and I helped his Aunt Pat make a video call,” Cunningham said. Gant died later that evening at 7:10 p.m., Pacific Standard Time.

For Gant’s family and friends, the work didn’t end.

Due to Gant’s hospital bills exceeding $80,000, the hospital would not release his death certificate or his body to his mother, Brenda Drane Boyd, until the bill was paid.

Local connections and memorial service

After several days of continuing to share Gant’s story on social media and a Jan. 11 candlelight vigil at Dimmitt Middle School, the GoFundMe account reached its $86,000 goal. Gant’s body was released to his family, who had him cremated at a funeral home in Cebu.

Once the necessary paperwork has been completed, including CDC quarantine documents, affidavits, release papers, verified copies of Gant’s death certificate and documentation from the U.S. Embassy in Cebu, Gant may return to his beloved Skyway and the community who loved him.

“I was his ‘Aunt Pat.’ Because of him, all his friends called me Aunt Pat, too. After he left to travel, he would always send me money to get my Joyce Meyer books,” Gant’s aunt told The Reporter in an email. “Jon was very outgoing, outspoken, very loving. He was always going to tell you the truth no matter if you wanted to hear it or not. He wanted people to be the best they could be.”

For his friend Katoya Grant, he was like “an annoying little brother” when the two met in sixth grade, and they remained great friends for decades.

“I’m Grant and he’s Gant, so we teased each other about our names,” said Grant, who liked to call Gant her “little brother” because she was older than him by a few days. “He was six-foot-six and when you see people that tall, they’re so big and so serious, but he was not like that. He was a kid at heart.”

Along with bringing Gant home and working to create a physical commemoration of him to be placed in a park in Skyway, his loved ones are planning a large memorial service in Gant’s honor.

“His biggest wish was bringing people together, all of the people that he loved coming together to laugh and share stories,” said Grant.

The memorial service is expected to take place at Renton High School — where Gant graduated class of 2002 — in the beginning of March.

As friends and family wait for Gant’s return, they say that he will be missed tremendously.

“He taught people how to remove themselves from the rat race, to see what life is about, to put yourself in a position to be present, not to worry about materialistic things, to be your authentic self — he embraced that, would speak to that light,” said Grant. ” He met people where they were, he didn’t pass judgement on a soul. I will miss that so much about him.”