You are in fact agreeing with what I said, in that we do experience peace and joy whenever we manage to lessen some of our cravings (and overcoming a state of depression is an especially clear example of this). But very few people hold freeing themselves of their spiritual fetters as their fundamental goal in life, and even fewer manage to achieve this. Thus, there is clearly a way in which life is synonymous with suffering, at least as a default state that we are all mired in from birth.

The Buddhist point of view on this is closer to “the default state of life is unsatisfactoriness”. The word “suffering” tends to elicit thoughts about pain and distracts from the myriad of other ways humans “suffer” daily.

> life is no more synonymous with suffering than it is with peace and joy

I’d argue that by default, life is closer to “unsatisfactoriness” than peace and joy, due largely to the evolutionary drives that make us strive for more. While you may be fortunate enough to experience the latter, it comes only through deliberate effort and a successful navigation of life’s basic survival requirements. Living in a modern society shields most people from the more persistent existential suffering of our ancestors.

Hunger, thirst and bodily breakdown are guaranteed. Peace and joy are optional, but what make life worth living. But it is seeing “suffering” for what it is - a mental state that we have the power to change - that makes living a peaceful and joyous life possible.

I've already pointed out that suffering is inherent to life for most of us, so it encompasses far more than "a few weeks or month[s]". You seem to be focusing on the aversion of physical or spiritual pain, but that's merely one sort of suffering which is not different in nature from the far subtler and less obvious suffering we all experience throughout our lives.