Post-publishing Depression

Yes, you read that correctly, and I'm going through it right now. It's a very real thing . . . for me, anyway. My next stop is Goodreads where I'll find out if any of my author friends experience the same thing.

Did you ever plan a really extravagant vacation? If you have, you'll know what I'm talking about here. You plan for months, maybe even years. You do the research, pick the best locations, look into flights, hotels, or tours (okay, for me it's cruises). You suck your family into the planning and everyone gets so excited you can hardly stand to be around each other without talking about it.
You with me?
Then you take the vacation and it's great. All seven days of it. Then it's done and you come home and you sit down and say, "What now?"
You unpack and mope around the house for a while. You do a little laundry and then maybe upload your pictures on the computer, longing for that wonderful feeling you had the last few days leading up to the vacation.

Now insert BOOK in place of VACATION. We plan for months (maybe even years). We do all the research,pick the best setting and look into details we're unsure of. We suck our families into the planning, asking them to help come up with character names, places, or situations. We get so excited that we can hardly stand to talk about anything else during the months of writing and subsequent editing. Then we publish it and it goes into the Abyss along with the millions of other books available out there.
So, we pack up our notes, binders and drafts and put them into a box that gets tucked away somewhere in the office closet. Then we repeatedly admire the pretty cover picture that is now next to the description of our book that is live on Amazon.
Then we mope around the house for a while, contemplating doing all the things we neglected to do during the writing and editing process. Cleaning out the fridge, dusting the baseboards, making sure the kids are well fed . . stuff like that.

But, ultimately, just as I always start planning my next vacation the day I step off the plane/ship/beach, I end up picking up that brand new binder I've been holding onto. I fill it with divider tabs, fresh paper and sticky notes, because as a writer, there is only one thing I know that will cure my post-publishing depression . . .

Writing another book.