Between the ages of 16 and 21, the big night out wasn’t just a hobby, it was a calling. Getting together with friends, getting drunk, being blasted by music, meeting new friends in the smoking area, getting more drunk, somehow making it home eight hours later – these were things I excelled at, the precious moments where I could try to lose myself and avoid the anxiety that inevitably came with daybreak.

The escapism wasn’t just selfish fun. It felt like a necessary avoidance of reality, which for me consisted of having a mother with a terminal illness who would die when I was 19, leaving me at university to cope with my grief. Going out, dancing and chatting rubbish to friends was one way to survive.

I never usually went out alone, as that would mean being forced to engage with my thoughts and emotions. Except for one humid summer’s night in 2014 when I was 21, with my university years coming to a close and the prospect of moving back in with my widowed dad fast approaching: I found myself on a big night out with no company.

The night was intended as one last blowout with friends before I was due to move out of my university digs in Bristol and, hopefully, enter the adult world. Five of us travelled to a warehouse on the outskirts of town to see the dub-influenced producer the Bug play with the MC Flowdan.

But the pre-game shots and drinking games must have been especially potent because, by the time we arrived, one of the group was denied entry for being too drunk. The rest of us carried on until another of the group left for the smoking area, found someone to snog and never came back. That left me with a couple who were renowned over the three years of their university relationship for erupting into explosive rows. This final night was no different. I left for the loo and by the time I was back, they had begun bickering, then shouting at each other, before ultimately storming off into the street.

Left to my own devices, I finished my drink and felt a simmering anxiety begin to creep in. I fidgeted and was just about to leave when it hit me – a sound so loud and menacing it felt like the music was reaching inside to rearrange my organs. My knees quivered and the fillings in my molars rattled. This was the Bug finally coming on stage with his signature bass pressure, a noise so intense it seemed dangerous.

I felt the flickering of a fight-or-flight response, but with foam earplugs soon shoved in, confused and aurally overloaded, I stood and began to sway to the rhythm while the thoughts I had been avoiding bubbled up: what would I do for work? How would I survive back in the family home? What was I meant to do with my life now my mum was gone?

Rather than panic, though, the aggression of the music – its sheer loudness – started to scream back at the fear I was feeling. It was strange and compelling, and the longer I stayed, the more I began to feel tolerant of that discomfort – of the volume and of my fears. I could withstand the intensity, I realised, and maybe even enjoy it.

I stayed for a few hours, sweating and dancing on my own, and made it home exhausted. I didn’t suddenly have a revelation that I was healed or that life would always be OK. I just found myself letting those thoughts and feelings emerge for the first time, rather than always trying to run away from them. The next morning, with my ears ringing, I felt a tiny jolt of excitement about the uncertainty that lay ahead of me – even if it meant moving back into my childhood bedroom.

In the decade since that night out, I have become increasingly comfortable in my own company, and with those lingering thoughts that emerge when I’m alone. I would usually prefer to spend nights out with friends, but sometimes I seek out time by myself. It can be precious, poignant or silly fun, and I now know that if everyone else happens to disappear again, I can still dance and make my own good time.