About two weeks ago, I got dumped.

It was shitty, as being dumped always is. I’ve not been dumped many times in my life—it’s me who usually does the dumping. Dumping someone isn’t pleasant either, but at least you feel a bit more in control of the situation. This one came as a bit of a surprise too.

Well, for a couple of days I’d sensed that something was up, and I’d had that horrible feeling in the pit of my stomach. But the weekend before the dumping I’d left the person’s house (they live in a different city) with them saying “I don’t want you to leave; I wish you didn’t have to go,” so getting a phone call four days later saying “I don’t want you to come” was a shock.

So, I did what anyone does when they get dumped: I called one of my best friends and went out and got very drunk. And then the next day I went swimming with sharks.

That’s right, you heard me, I went swimming with sharks. It wasn’t a last minute decision, it was a birthday present bought for me by a bunch of my university friends back in May. It just happened to fall the day after I got dumped, as if we needed any more proof that fate has a wicked sense of humour.

Now, a well known thing about me is that I love shark films. I prefer the bad ones to the good ones (think “Deep Blue Sea,” and “Jaws 4: The Revenge”). I watch a lot of shark films, I live tweet shark films despite the fact that at least four people unfollow me every time, and I’ve even written articles about shark films. However, my love of shark films does not translate into a desire to swim with sharks. I love “Silence of the Lambs” but I don’t want to go on a date with Hannibal Lecter. If I can be any clearer on this point: there was not a single fibre of my being that wanted to swim with sharks. But my friends had bought me a present (and, I imagine, an expensive present), so there was no backing out of it.

On Saturday morning I arrived at London Aquarium with a swimsuit, a hangover, and a heavy heart. Before you get into the shark tank, you get a behind-the-scenes tour of the aquarium. It’s fascinating – our guide certainly knew her stuff, but even that part is a little sad. In one tank are the starfish, resting from being over-handled by eager tourists. They are limp-limbed and exhausted. Alone in another tank, Gertrude—the turtle who continually escapes the turtles’ show tank, even though all the other turtles happily doze and play in their unnatural habitat. Gertrude, I suspect, wants more from life.

And so to the shark tank… As you stand at the side of the tank, you are made to sign a waiver that they expressly tell you not to read. If anything confirmed my belief that I was about to die, this was it. As I put on my wetsuit, I briefly considered the life I had lived. I concluded, mainly, that I probably hadn’t boned enough. And with that thought I approached my watery grave.

Three other people, all of whom were strangers, were getting in the tank with me. I made sure they all got in before me so I was closest to the ladder and could get back out first. Once in the tank, you’d think you would be in a cage, but no, you’re behind a rope net; a rope net that a shark could easily bite through with its multiple sets of teeth. In the London Aquarium tank there are three different kinds of shark: Sand Tiger, Black Tip Reef, and Brown. Some of those fuckers are over eight feet long. Let’s not forget that these sharks have been in a tank for a long time. Sure, they’re fed more regularly than a wild shark. Maybe they’ve been in that tank their whole lives. Maybe they’re sharks that don’t know the freedom of the vast ocean. But, I think, somewhere inside their womb-shaped brains they sense they’re missing something, and they’re angry about it.

As I mentioned previously, I’ve seen a lot of shark films. This meant that every time I saw one swim towards me, I was absolutely certain that would be the moment it went batshit crazy. That would be the moment it would take out its frustration from being cooped up and stared at on one of the funny creatures with four long, easily biteable limbs. How was it to know that I was not its captor? How was it to know that I’m not responsible for its confusing but visceral sense that something is very wrong with its life? What’s more, I thought I was on the safe side of the tank next to a wall for a good two minutes, before I realised that were two huge, seemingly moustachioed sharks sleeping right next to me. Sleeping? Yeah right. Oldest trick in the book.

The sharks were amazing: big, silent and elegant. Really something to behold. But, the entire time I spent in the tank I thought I was going to die. When I got out of the tank, my hangover had been cleared by cold water and adrenaline, and I was very, very glad to be alive. You might even say I was happy.

Not many people get to say the sentence “I got dumped and then I went swimming with sharks.” One friend asked “Did they dump you by pushing you into a shark tank?” which is a bit unfair; I wasn’t dating a Bond villain. For the ten or fifteen minutes that I was in the tank, I didn’t think about my break-up, not once. Because I’ll tell you what: the fear of death certainly does distract you from the pain of rejection. And when I left the aquarium I went out and got drunk again, because that works too.