Please reduce the amount of durability lunge uses or let spears have mendin

as someone with hundreds of hours in the game, after a few minutes of testing I realized the spear is useless in survival when compared to the sword. why would I ever use a netherite ingot to make a weapon that I can use only a handful of times when the sword (which is mush simpler to wield and better overall) can be used literally infinitely with mending? It seems baffling from a balance perspective and just a fun perspective.