In September 1922, a military coup forced King Constantine I to abdicate in favor of his son George II, and to go into exile. Without any real power and dominated by the revolutionaries, after a failed coup of a pro-royalist group (the so-called Leonardopoulos–Gargalidis coup d'état) in October 1923, the new sovereign in turn was forced to abdicate after only fifteen months of reign. Devastated by these events, Helen immediately went to Italy to be with her parents in their exile. Shortly after the coronation of King Ferdinand I and Queen Marie of Romania in Alba Iulia on 15 October 1922, Helen left for Palermo, where she remained until the death of her father, on 11 January 1923.