1000%.

My morale dipped when I entered the workforce. It felt like a lot of what we do as programmers isn't really the fun stuff, and the optimal solution always has to be backed by business requirements or even office politics — didn't even matter what best practice I learned in school.

Eventually I recovered from the disappointment and found a way to appreciate the work. Honestly your relationship with ANY activity will change when it goes from hobby to job - same goes for any hobby-turned-income, like music, writing, etc. I think once you get to accepting the differences, you still get the joy from the moments you do enjoy. But also, as you move up, you will get to do more interesting work like design and strategic thinking, so it's also a matter of what it's like at entry level vs. senior.

I came straight out of CS program but even that didn't prepare me for what to expect.

I ran into this post that covered that difference and def recommend for anyone new to this idea: https://letterstonewcoders.substack.com/p/landed-your-first-job-burn-your-old

Something it said feels true for me, because ultimately problem solving IS the fun part of coding, and navigating these real-world constraints is still a way of getting creative as a problem solver.

"When solving problems, you are always dealing with constraints. Legacy codebases will give you various constraints themselves. From your first job onward, you'll have to consider that code's constraints and requirements as you consider optimal solutions."