One of my teachers said some 20 years ago about psychoanalysis: “All you have to do is to interpret defenses and conflicts. That's all—defenses and contents of conflicts.” But I know that he also used other interventions in order to reach that goal.

With children in psychoanalysis, you also use interpretations even from the beginning. You can interpret defenses and affects and later the drive the child is defending against. Also if the child is testing his analyst by acting out in the beginning, which I think is quite common, it should be interpreted right away. As Katan (1961) has pointed out, it is surprising how promptly he can stop acting. He doesn't really have the need once it has been verbalized. One doesn't have to hold the child.

Sometimes, however, a child analyst has to restrain his patient physically,