The author suggests a particular reading of the thesis put forward by
Freud in 'Analysis terminable and interminable' that an effective and
more definitive conclusion may be expected in analyses of cases with t
raumatic aetiology. This reading shifts the emphasis from the patient'
s history to the possibility of its crystallising in focal nuclei emer
ging within the analytic relationship under the pressure of the termin
ation. The revival of separation anxieties which cannot be worked thro
ugh, and their crystallisation in precipitating traumatic events, may
give rise to decisive psychic work allowing the analysis to be brought
to a conclusion. Two case histories are presented to show how the end
of the analysis assumes the form of a new trauma, which reactivates i
n the present, traumatic anxieties from the patient's own infantile hi
story. In the first case a premature birth and in the second a miscarr
iage, originally experienced as isolated automatic events without time
or history, are relived in the terminal phase as vicissitudes of the
transference, so that new meaning can be assigned to them and they can
be withdrawn from the somatic cycle of repetition. The powerful tende
ncy to act out and the intense countertransference pressure on the ana
lyst are discussed in the light of the specificities of this phase, wh
ich is crucial to the success of the analysis. This leads to a re-exam
ination, in the concluding notes, of some theoretical questions inhere
nt in the problem of the termination and, in particular, to a discussi
on of the ambiguous concept of a natural ending.