The Father's Day incident led to two charges before the court to which the man has pleaded guilty. Both are for an assault on a person in a family relationship.
However, the father has pleaded not guilty to 28 other charges including raping a female aged 12 to 16, attempted rape, unlawful sexual connection, indecent assault, assaulting a person with a blunt instrument, assault on a female and attempted unlawful sexual connection.
The man also denied ill-treating a dog and supplying the girl with cannabis and magic mushrooms. He has told the court that he grew cannabis in the kitchen for his own consumption.
The man's lawyer, Leo Lafferty, has said that the defence case will be that the other alleged physical and sexual abuse did not happen.
Opening the defence case on Wednesday, Lafferty said: "Beside the Father's Day incident, he did not cause or do any other physical abuse towards toward (his daughter).
"Equally important, he did not do any sexual misconduct."
The father said he hit his daughter, who was 14 at the time, because she was answering him back.
"I realised what I had done and I walked into the kitchen. I said sorry to her and got an ice pack," he said.
He suggested she should call the police or go to a doctor, but she said no.
Lafferty asked him how he felt at that time.
"I felt horrible. I felt that what I had done was wrong," the man said. "That was the worst decision I ever made in my life."
He said he had never committed any sexual misconduct with his daughter.
The man said that after the Father's Day incident, the girl went to her mother's on holiday and did not return to live with him.
The trial before Judge Russell Collins and a jury of six men and six women is continuing.
