HAVE YOU seen them? You must have. You can’t get away from them. Up and down the high street, there they are mocking you. Daring you, even.

String, underwired, tie-side or full brief, the bikini may be just a few square inches of Lycra but it can be the most terrifying invention known to womankind, capable of turning strong, confident women into quivering messes.

And you can run from them but you can’t hide.

Ok, I am being a bit dramatic but there is no escaping that the temperatures are finally up and bikini time is just around the corner.

Everywhere people are talking about how to get the perfect beach body, this year’s key shapes and what’s in and what’s out (animal print and fifties shapes are in by the way).

Every woman has her own particular bikini body hang-ups, no matter what her shape – big or small (well maybe not Elle Macpherson but then she is superhuman. I am certain of it).

For some it is the muffin top. Others hate their hips or their bottom, they feel their breasts are too big or too small.

I, like millions of other females, hate my bum and thighs.

I am lucky that my stomach flattens with just a few (hundred) crunches but I could walk from Lands End to John O’ Groats on the stepper and still have blancmange on my backside.

My husband will say it looks fine. Friends say I am being daft but I know I am not happy about the wobbly bits or the stretchmarks (and I haven’t even had any kids – they were a puberty gift from Mother Nature).