A really good question, to which I'll give an anecdotal "yes" from 30+ years teaching; Maybe depression is too strong a word, but massive "anti-climax" plus ex

A really good question, to which I'll give an anecdotal "yes" from 30+ years teaching; Maybe depression is too strong a word, but massive "anti-climax" plus exhaustion fits. People work on a major thesis like MSc or PhD and by the end of it they're absolutely lost in a micro-world. The day after graduation more than a few students turn up for a "what the fuck am I going to do with my life now?" crisis tutorial. I've seen authors and games developers get the same, inclusing myself. After 6 months of "crunch time" they just run off a cliff like Wile E. Coyote and keep running in mid-air before plunging. Their manager knows they're finished but their own nervous system hasn't got the memo yet. For cyclic stuff like software releases I suppose that can also be mixed with the dread of what is to come on the next round. In bigger firms I've seen clever managers move people around between projects in overlapping waterfall, so they don't get too emotionally invested in the "the big day" for "their baby".