Freud thought that the analytic process was akin to a natural process. This idea enjoyed a certain success in Psychoanalytic Institutes because it would have made it possible to teach analysts in training how an analysis was supposed to unfold. It was argued that this idea was particularly valid for the child, whose development goes through stages that are relatively predictable in advance. In reality, in child and adult alike, the analytic process can only be studied usefully over sequences of a few sessions. We know that the analytic process is developing if the analyst is surprised by the material that follows an interpretation. It is such a process, and not the number of sessions, that constitutes the difference between psychoanalysis and psychotherapy with children.