Dylan Sloan photos
Celebration Saturday on Gorham as crew lifts Hill out ambulance.
Danton Hill returned home from the hospital Saturday — after surviving an eight-month bout with Covid-19, including 77 days in the intensive care unit, and warnings to his wife that she might need to “pull the plug.”
Hill, a 65-year-old army veteran and retired Omni Hotel employee, made it back home to Hamden Saturday morning to the sounds of dozens of friends and family honking their car horns and cheering in support.
His was an improbable journey home.
On April 6, Hill was admitted to the ICU at Yale New Haven Hospital after being diagnosed with Covid-19.
Hill underwent a kidney transplant three years earlier. He has a history of medical difficulties. ICU medical staff took to calling him the “Miracle Man” for his remarkable ability to beat a series of prior illnesses.
In fighting the virus, he faced the biggest challenge to his health yet. Over his 77 days confined to the ICU, doctors twice cautioned his wife, former New Haven Alder Brenda Foskey-Cyrus, that he was too ill to survive.
Two-hundred and fifty-seven days after he was admitted to the hospital, Hill returned home.
Foskey-Cyrus — his partner of 14 years, the last four as a married couple — was there waiting.
While getting her nails painted Saturday, Foskey-Cyrus recounted the timeline of her husband’s battle with the virus.
“It was very scary,” she said. “I’ve been through a lot.”
After over two months in the ICU, Hill was moved to Gaylord Hospital on June 21, still on a ventilator.
Soon after, a fissure on his arm began to swell. Doctors discovered a blood clot. Hill was rushed back to Yale New Haven Hospital.
His condition stabilized. Then he was diagnosed with pneumonia during his recovery.
Since early fall, Hill has received care at the Milford Health Center’s Rehab Facility, where his condition has steadily improved.
On two occasions, Hill’s situation was so severe that doctors advised Foskey-Cyrus to “pull the plug,” his wife said.
After hearing that for the first time this summer, Foskey-Cyrus visited Hill at the hospital.
“I told him his day was coming for him,” Foskey-Cyrus said. “But I said, ‘If you have any life in you, move your feet. Move your hand.’ The next day, a nurse told me that my husband had moved his index finger and wiggled his toes.”
Hill’s doctors initially told Foskey-Cyrus that keeping her husband on oxygen for any longer was futile, she said. But Foskey-Hill persisted, refusing to lose faith in Hill’s ability to overcome. She convinced the doctors to keep him on a ventilator.
Throughout the fall, Hill’s condition steadily improved. He became able to feed himself and walk the length of his hospital room. He stayed in near constant contact with his wife, who relayed every update to a network of family and friends.
“His favorite saying is, ‘I’m breathing and thinking,’” Foskey-Cyrus recalled.
On Wednesday, Foskey-Cyrus received the news that her husband would finally be returning home three days later.
She got to work inviting dozens of people to welcome Hill home when the ambulance dropped him off.
An hour before Hill was discharged, his house was filled with excitement. Foskey-Cyrus had organized a display of banners and photos with signed messages from his family and friends.
Pinkia Foskey wore a shirt emblazoned with the words “Welcome Home” above a photo of Hill and Foskey-Cyrus.
When the ambulance pulled into a CVS parking lot two blocks away from Hill’s house just before 11 a.m., it was greeted by close to a dozen cars filled with friends and family cheering and honking their horns. The ambulance put on its lights and made its way to its final destination, the Foskey-Cyrus homestead on Gorham Avenue.
As the line of cars proceeded down the street, horns blazing and passengers cheering, neighbors came out onto their porches to investigate the commotion. They immediately joined in, applauding as the ambulance rolled by. Today, everybody would be celebrating.
The rear doors to the ambulance opened, revealing Hill with arms raised high in celebration. He beamed beneath his mask at the sight of the cheering crowd.
“Now you know what love feels like,” said Hill as he was being helped onto the sidewalk. “This is love.”
When Hill reentered his home, he sat inside the front doorway for a few minutes, gazing out at the crowd on his sidewalk. After almost nine months in the hospital, his improbable recovery was complete.
“This makes my heart swell with love,” said Hill. “I’m amazed. I owe all of this to my sweet, beautiful wife. That’s why I call her ‘sweetie.’”