After walking across the United States three times to show stroke victims that there is life after suffering a stroke, four-time stroke survivor Mycle Brandy of San Clemente has thousands of Facebook friends. They know him as that big, 300-pound guy with a broad smile, a walking stick and long locks.
This week, the long locks are long gone.
The cane is still there, and so is the smile, even though Brandy, 64, is undergoing chemotherapy for liver disease. On Nov. 13, he accomplished a goal that he had set for himself two years ago.
“I got the idea of donating my hair,” he said. “I didn’t know that I was going to be losing it faster than I could cut it off. Six weeks ago, I started noticing it in the shower drain.”
Figuring it might be only a matter of time until the side-effects of chemo would relieve him of his hair, he made a haircut appointment at Salon Revelation in Dana Point. His hair designer, Shelle Sandberg, sheared 11.5 inches of hair that she said will go to Pantene Beautiful Lengths, a charity that provides wigs to women who are losing their hair to cancer treatment.
“Our real-hair wigs help women fighting cancer feel like themselves again,” Pantene’s website says.
Brandy is not only donating hair but is also confident that his health will be fine next year to do a fourth walk across America, more than 2,900 miles from San Francisco to Stamford, Conn.
He did his first three – Irvine to Washington, D.C., in 2010; San Diego to Seattle in 2011; and Maine to Miami in 2013 – between bouts with liver disease. Along the way, he visited hospitals, did media interviews and so inspired stroke patients that some sought him out as he passed through their area. A few even walked with him for a stint.
From Maine to Miami, he averaged 17 miles a day, walking with his cane.
His wife, Louise, has supported the retired glazer’s cross-country walks, has visited him along the way and has walked with him the final few miles of his walks.
Brandy works out at Fitness Elite/Xtreme Fitness in San Clemente and can be seen on San Clemente’s Beach Trail and on walks to Dana Point, he said, albeit walking less frequently while undergoing chemo.
Contact the writer: fswegles@ocregister.com or 949-492-5127
