B&B: Tuesday December 13, 2011 Episode

Here are my thoughts on the December 13, 2011 episode of The Bold and the Beautiful. This was a special edition as it focused on the foster care system.

Stephanie (Susan Flannery) along with Hope (Kimberly Matula) went looking for Beverly (Gina Rodriquez) after she was unjustly fired from her Forrester internship. She and Dayzee (Kristolyn Lloyd) were on a bus together. Dayzee was trying to make Beverly feel better, as she was livid over what happened at Forrester. Meanwhile Pam (Alley Mills) and Jackie (Lesley-Anne Down) were talking about why Beverly was let go—Pam had stolen the designs and given them to Jackie. Her design house Jackie M made knock offs, based on them. As Beverly took photos of the clothing, she was blamed. After the fact, Stephanie and Hope realized that they were wrong to blame Beverly for the crime.

Hope and Stephanie caught up to the bus, and to make it stop Stephanie stepped into the street. The bus driver had to halt the bus or else she would have gotten hit. Beverly was angry, but got off the bus. It was understandable that Beverly was blamed, but due to her circumstances as always being the new person she tended to get that treatment. Getting that at Forrester was just something that Beverly could not handle. This opportunity gave her hope, but if she feels like she cannot be trusted, continuing to work there would be a mistake. Ironically the one person who saw what the chance meant to her was Pam, who damaged it. Pam wanted to make things right, but Jackie is trying to keep her quiet.

Dayzee and Beverly explained how Beverly was in a transitional home for kids that aged out of foster care. The startling statistic that more than half of criminals (I think they said over 60%) in California prisons were in foster care was mentioned. Beverly talked about how she loved her foster parents, but never knew what happened, and Dayzee spoke to that as well. Stephanie was sympathetic and explained how while she had money she had little choices. She grew up in an abusive home, though in those days it was not frowned upon by anyone. Stephanie left as a teen, went to college, discovered she was pregnant (with Ridge though he was not mentioned by name), than fell in love, got married and didn’t tell her husband he wasn’t the child’s father.

The episode ended with a real life person named Ricardo talking about his life and family. He lost his mother at 11, went into foster care and had a bad situation. Now he is in the transitional housing, getting his life together and being a parent to his less than two-year-old child. The Wednesday episode sounds will focus on more real life stories.

The program references visiting unitedfriends.org for more information about the foster care situation in the United States. This particular show was part fiction, but the end was real. Hearing such stories isn’t easy, though there is always hope for change.