Emily Writes put the call out for your dirty little secrets about parenting and was inundated by text, email, and private message. Here’s the best of the worst.

I have a favourite child. I try not to, and I don’t think my other kids would ever know. But I really like my first born the most. He’s the calmest and the quietest. I feel mean for thinking that but we have such a special bond and my other kid is such a massive pain in the ass.

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I once spent an hour in public with poo on my forehead before someone told me.

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When my baby was born it took me a while to bond with them because I thought they’d be the opposite gender, and it was as if I had to mourn the loss of the other baby who never existed before I could fall in love with the one I actually had.

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Stuck on the couch again. Baby is colicky and will only settle while upright and on either me or husband. I daydream of fashioning a baby-safe saddle for my dog so he can help while I drink my tea. If the family in Peter Pan has a dog that is like the kids’ nanny, I am pretty sure my dog can be as well… right?

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I have fed everyone in our house, including myself, food off the floor. The same floor that one of us may have pissed on.

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I purposely suck up my daughter’s Lego in the vacuum cleaner and I love it.

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I look at my baby and wonder. A face only a mother would love. I look at my husband and we both giggle and whisper to each other at the same time: “So ugly’“.

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I pay my daughter two dollars to bring me my pants on cold mornings so I can get changed under the blankets.

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My child once pushed another child over at the park and the child’s mother came over and I said it wasn’t my child. It was so satisfying. She said “What a little shit” and I agreed, because he was being a little shit.

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Although I love my adopted son very much, I sometimes fantasise about what my life would be like if I didn’t have him.

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I sometimes get fully dressed to take my daughter to preschool and when I get home I get back into PJs for my home office job.

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This morning we sat our toddler on the floor, turned on cartoons and gave him a bowl filled with sweet and salty popcorn. Then we had sex.

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When my baby was born I was horrified by how ugly he was. He is much cuter now.

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Sometimes I pretend my children belong to someone else so I can be more patient with them.

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I do not live for my children. I love them and I love our family, even our family life, but I don’t feel obsessed with them or anxious when I’m not with them. I don’t feel guilty when I drop them off at daycare (once I knew they were happy and settled in and well taken care of). I enjoy the relationship they have with their grandparents and am happy for them to have them whenever they want to. I don’t pine for them while they’re with them, but I do love seeing them again when they get home.

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My child is a jerk.

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During a playdate I caught my five year old and his friend playing with my vibrator – they were using it as a microphone. I grabbed it and hid it. I’ve never told anyone that.

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My daughter hits me all the time. She gave me a black eye once and I had to say I walked into a door. She’s four and I’m scared she’s a psychopath.

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My wife’s parents said they’d take our kids for the night so we could go to a wedding. It was our first time childless in four years. We bought some weed to have a sneaky sesh before the wedding (our first in about six years). We got super baked, had sex on the couch, then accidentally fell asleep right after and missed the wedding. We slept from 4pm until the morning. It was awesome. We told our friends we got the date wrong.

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I miss my old life so much it hurts. I miss everything about it. I really miss being selfish. Not just being able to watch TV whenever I want but also being spontaneous. I miss fancy dinners. My children are such fuckwits in restaurants.

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All the babies in my SPACE group are ugly.

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On more than one occasion I have helped my son search the house for his chocolate that I ate.

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If the kids wet the bed at night and I can get away with it I will just put a towel down and deal with it in the morning.

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I eat my husband’s treats and blame the kids.

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I sometimes answer my children by whispering “Why don’t you go and show Daddy that?”

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I tell my son the bath is closed at least once a week because I can’t be fucked. Same goes for parks and anything he wants to do that I don’t really.

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I don’t love my three children equally. I have a favourite. My fear is as they grow older they will work it out.

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I use bath time as an opportunity to sit in the corner and catch up on Twitter.

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Sometimes I organise playdates just to hang out with mums that I think are cool.

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I let my four-year-old rummage through her siblings’ school lunches at the end of each day and eat whatever she can find, even if it’s been on the floor a day or more. I call it developing independent foraging skills.

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I intentionally buy my son pajamas that can pass as clothes in case I run out of time to dress him in the morning.

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I gave my kid chilli chocolate and told her that all chocolate tastes like that so I’d never have to share my stash.

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I’ve let my kids wag school just because I didn’t want to adult that day.

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I’ve told people that my kids have nits just so I don’t have to go see them.

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I sometimes put my my fourth child to bed in her clothes so I don’t have to get her dressed in the morning. And by sometimes, I mean every night.

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I blocked the toilet at home and blamed it on my son.