To feel a bit sad about this comment from DP

What I am taking from this statement by him is that he is telling you what you can do with your time, while he cares for his own child. How would he react if you told him how he should spend his time, whilst you are parenting? He sounds like a bully and a prick.

When both ft we were actually like this, it was very much a ‘I need this day, you can have this day’. It is as someone said above, a horrible way to live but you’re both tired, you’re both busy and then plans come up too. Never used the word ‘babysitting’ but that doesn’t matter as it was terrible

I personally find looking after my own children a chore. So I tend not to inflict it on others such as DH unless it's necessary, because I dislike it being done to me. But that doesn't mean you aren't deserving or allowed to have free time!

What I'm saying is it's not a male thing specifically.

You could be going out clubbing, taking part in pie eating contests or sitting on a bench staring into space.

It doesn’t matter what you do with your free time, as long as you enjoy it because it’s your free time!

The fact that you’re actually using that time to train is amazing.

What does he do with his free time?

Honestly, I’d put the training on hold and focus on going out with your friends and doing fun social things.

What sort of person tries to guilt trip/shame their partner because they have to parent their own child for a short amount of time.

I would focus on feeling angry not sad.

Put him right

I agree with this.

I don't understand how you are managing with no childcare when he is working full time and you are part time plus retraining.

His use of words were poor but it sounds like you are both stretched too thin and something has to give.

That's a bit of a drip feed op. That your retraining but it hasn't gone as you both planned. Surely this is more about how to move your training along than the term insensitivity put babysitting

He is fed up of me not progressing at the rate he and I had hoped, and so he's basically saying if I'm not going to make progress then he doesn't want to give me the time

'Give' you the time?! He isn't 'giving' you anything. He's not 'giving you time' and he's not 'babysitting'. He's literally just being a parent to his own child. He sounds vile.

Let me guess when you are In charge of your daughter he goes out sees friends does things other than just working

yet he feels he is babysitting (he really isn’t he is her father) he can tell you what to do because you aren’t progressing fast enough because obviously you have so much time because childcare (that he doesn’t want to spend time on himself) is in his eyes easy

This!

I’m yet to hear any woman call looking after their own child/ren ‘babysitting’… funny, that…

He shouldn't refer to babysitting his own child.

But I think YABU to think that he should actively long to spend time with her. If he's working full time and you don't have any paid childcare you must both be knackered! It's natural for him to want a break.

Stop telling him what progress you're making or not making. Tell him you need the time and that's that.

It is not possible for a father to babysit his own child.

He isn't a bad father in any way?! What?! He calls looking after his own child 'babysitting' - that does not make him a good father. Please don't have any more children with him, can you imagine all the baby-sitting he WONT be doing for the children?

He isn’t babysitting, ffs, he’s parenting.

Like he is supposed to do, since he is her actual parent.

If he thinks raising his own child himself some of the time means you need to merit that time to his internal standard, he’s woefully misunderstood what this parenting lark is about.

Hmm I’m not sure if this the same or not but I have said to DH that if his side business isn’t going to make money then I’d appreciate him being at home more rather than leaving all the childcare to me to progress what is essentially a hobby at this stage. For us we don’t have much family time because of our work so the extra time is precious and I felt like I was either working or looking after DC on my own when I wanted family time. Not sure if that’s helpful from a different perspective.

Yeah i'd find that hurtful too.

Your dd doesn't really need him. She's got you. Thats all she needs -especially when he doesn't really want to parent her anyway.

Basically he sees his child as YOUR responsibility. And he "babysits" his own child as a favour to you. SMH

OP you need to sit down and have a serious discussion.

He's a prick. He needs to be reminded of a few things.

This is his child. He isn't babysitting his own child, he's parenting. Tell him he calls it babysitting again you'll be reassessing the whole family set up.

He also needs to be told that he isn't the boss of you and if you parted ways you would be having a load more free time when he spends contact time with his child.

Cheeky fucker.

Tbh he probably does see it as a chore. Because however much you might love your child, being at the beck and call of, and providing entertainment for, a young child isn't everyone's idea of a fun way to spend the hours you're not in your full time job. It's hard work that I admit I didn't enjoy myself when my DC were that age. So, I'd not hold his feelings on the matter against him. Parenting has many stages, and not loving the toddler years doesn't mean you won't be great with school age or teens.

That said, a good parent accepts that love it or loathe it, you signed up for it, and that's not the fault of the child or their other parent. So you need to do your share of what has to be done with your game face on, and not whinge and impose restrictions on how the other parent spends their share of the free time.

My DH and I used to fall into this trap regularly. There's just to much to be doing, that if one of us takes on solo parenting time at a point where the load would usually shared, we would expect the other to be at least doing something towards the mammoth to do list. However, this was a very unhealthy way to be, and 5 years in we both now realise that in addition to 'productive solo time' people also need time to do whatever the fudge they want without being answerable to anyone. However it took a lot of discussions and working stuff out for us to reach a status quo we were both happy with.

What did DP say when you brought this up with him?

OP he's not 'giving' you time; he's doing his fair share of childcare - it's not a favour, or something you should be made to feel grateful for, it's part of his job as a parent.