Bold & Beautiful Heartbreak: Eric’s Devastating Secret Has Finally Come Out and the Tears Won’t Be Stopping Anytime Soon

The moment of truth is at hand on The Bold and the Beautiful for Eric, his family and even the viewers. We’ve finally got a clear picture of how bad it is… and the news just about stopped our hearts. As Donna explained to Katie on the show’s Tuesday, October 24 episode, it all began with tremors in Eric’s hands. But that wasn’t so bad because it led to his collaboration with RJ and that was, as Katie put it, “magic. Until it wasn’t.”

Eric’s pain became debilitating, Donna notes, and then came the blood that Eric began coughing up. “The doctor said he only has six months to live,” she told her sister. “Maybe less.”

And that’s just the start. In the episode that airs on Thursday, October 26, Eric makes a heartbreaking and arguably long-overdue admission that leaves R.J. hunkily emotional. And the following day, as the patriarch of the Forrester family prepares to do battle on the runway with Ridge, Eric shares a special moment with the man that he’s considered a son since the day he was born — and even in the years after learning that Massimo Marone is his biological father. (Stephanie, you minx, you!)

It seems like the time has come for Eric to tell his loved ones that he isn’t long for this world. But… are we really about to lose him?! It’s tough to tell because we still aren’t entirely sure what’s going on with him. When Stephanie passed, we knew the culprit: Cancer. It had been treated, gone into remission, then came back and claimed Stephanie’s life.

Although Eric’s specific condition has not been named on air yet, we’ve certainly gotten the impression that the prognosis ain’t good. Of primary concern to his doctor is cerebrovascular disease, which can lead to strokes, embolisms, aneurysms, blood clots — a whole mess of things, and none of ’em good. Also a major worry are TIAs, transient ischaemic attacks — or, translated from Grey’s Anatomy-speak, mini strokes that result from an interruption of blood flow that deprives the brain of oxygen.

Eric, at least, keeps saying that we never know what the future holds. It could, fingers crossed, hold a miracle cure. But it could also force us to say goodbye to Eric Forrester as he joins Stephanie in the afterlife and leave a massive void in not just the show, or his family, but also our hearts.

If the Bold and the Beautiful does, at the end of this, introduce Eric to his maker, at least no one can say that he hasn’t lived — and loved! — enough for 10 people.