Triggers

I was recently at a social gathering and experienced a grief trigger that left me completely unraveled. I could feel myself internally disintegrating and I had to go home. Grief triggers are funny things. Sometimes I know I'm going in to a situation where they are likely and I can prepare myself in advance. So much more often however, they come out of nowhere. There are times when I can mentally calm myself and no one else may even notice. Other times I may be able to excuse myself briefly, go to the bathroom, take a quiet moment and pull myself together. Again, no one else would really notice that I had been triggered. But once in a while, the trigger catches me so off guard and hits me so hard that I can't recover. Flight mode takes over and I literally have to flee the scene. How do you graciously exit a social gathering as you mentally come undone? There is no grace in fleeing! At these times, I simply count on friends and family to understand and I believe they do.