CONFESSION: "It's the part of the body that no one talks about."

You know the part I’m talking about…

I have a body part I hate. I hate it, but no one talks about it, so I feel even more embarrassed and awkward about it.

Basically, it’s a fatty area above my pubic bone.  Not my tummy.  A couple of inches below that.  I lost a lot of weight in the past year or so and my tummy has gone down a lot but now the other area sticks out.  I’m serious, I can grab a handful.

You can see if if I wear a pencil skirt or a form-fitting dress.

And before you jump on me for shaming myself and say I should love my body, I know all of that. And I do. BUT…

Importantly, I know it’s an issue for me, which means it might be an issue for other women, so let’s take a moment and focus on my problematic pubic area.

You may know this area by some other, more unflattering names. According to Urban Dictionary it’s a “bulging area found on large, older women between the waist and the genital area. Not quite a gut, not quite a *unt… The Gunt.”

The other popular name is FUPA – an acronym for “Fat Upper Pubic Area”; or “Fat Upper Pussy Area.”

Whatever you call it, I want my FUPA/Gunt/protruding pubis GONE.

I’ve tried every type of shapewear from Spanx to Nancy Ganz but none of them actually focus on that area. The tummy controllers pull everything in but still show the mound near my meat curtains.  I swear if they invented ‘Nancy Ganz for Gunts’ (or Nancy Gunz) it would be a best seller.

So I went looking for other options.

I spoke to Trent Langlands a personal trainer to celebrities like Channel Nine’s Sylvia Jeffreys and Alison Langdon as well as chef Matt Moran. When I told him about my problem area he was a bit shocked: “In my entire career I have never had a client come to me about that area. They’ll complain about muffin tops, saddlebags and pot bellies but no-one talks about that area, so it must be really taboo.”

See this is why I’m bringing it out into the open! So, what exercise can I do to get rid of my pubic paunch?

“I don’t believe you can spot reduce. Silly stuff like sit ups are just going to make you really disappointed,” says Trent.  “You need a holistic approach and aim for losing centimetres off the entire body, not one area.”

“Nutrition is vital.  When it comes to losing weight I believe it’s 80% nutrition, 20% training.  The training will assist weight loss but you need to eat cleanly and well to get results.  You can’t out-train a bad diet,” he says.

Oh man. It’s so hard to eat clean.

Of course there is one way you can spot reduce: Liposuction.

It’s not something that is on my personal agenda, but I called Dr Amira Sanki from Silkwood Medical, a plastic surgeon who specialises in tummy tucks and body contouring after major weight loss.

“The medical term for what you’re describing is the Mons Pubis, which when translated means pubic mountain,” she says.

“It’s actually really, really common,” she says.  “What happens is when you are overweight, your tummy camouflages it, then when you lose weight, your tummy flattens and the mons pubis protrudes.”

“It is certainly a taboo topic.  It’s something I bring up with patients who have booked in for a tummy tuck.  I gently reassure them when I do the tuck I will also help to flatten it out the pubic area.  They are always so relieved and I realise they are too scared or embarrassed to mention it,” she says.

“It’s caused by fat and skin redundancy moving to the lowest point of gravity in the lower abdomen,” she says.

Thanks gravity.  I just had horrible visions of fat pooling in my flaps.  I shook my head and pushed on with the questions, “What if it’s not so bad that you need a whole tummy tuck?”

“If the tummy is not the problem we can reduce the size of the mons pubis with liposuction.  It’s a day procedure that only takes about an hour. There’s a 1 cm incision and you’d only need a few days off work.  You’re sore for a couple of weeks.  It would cost between $3000-$5000,” she says.

I asked her if it could be done with local anesthetic?  “Well I wouldn’t recommend it.  Put it this way, if a surgeon was going to put metal objects in that area on me, I’d like to be knocked out with a general.”

Oh boy.

All of a sudden the clean eating green smoothie diet seems more achievable.