I do not remember exactly what happened in the past years as the OP says. I only have my own analysis if bitcoin prices will not fall lower than $5k and stay at current prices ie in the range of $6k I'm sure bitcoin will recover from now even though we have to wait much longer until the market returns completely recovered.
I would like to see the price going lower than $5000, just to see how miners react to the fact that (supposedly) the price would be lower than production cost of a single coin. What would they do? Would they mine at a loss, or would they try to influence the price into being higher than this hypothetical $5000 floor? For now it seems to be working, Bitcoin refuses to go lower than that price range.
Depending on the rigs and the region some big miners are located, they are already mining at a loss.
In the last episode of the Bitcoin News Show a guy with the name Andrew form the company Hut8Mining said the average price for many miners to be profitable is in the 6000-7000 range. His company however, due to long term agreements, still has plenty of room. He said price could to $2000 until they start to mine at a loss.
So we are already in a tough price region already, from the point of view of many miners.