The “how are you” exchange is really just a conversation starter, a way for either one of you to talk about something that is on your mind. If you don’t reciprocate that, most people will just assume you don’t want to talk to them.

In general, if you just respond and don’t make any effort to ask questions or keep the conversation going, people will assume you don’t want to talk to them. You aren’t obligated to respond, but they are also not obligated to continue talking to someone who is clearly uninterested in talking to the .

So I guess the question is: Why do you want to talk to people if you aren’t interested in them at all?

If you’re looking for support and friendship, that is a 2-way street that requires you to support and care about them as well. Otherwise the other person can feel like you are just using them.

If you just feel that this is something you need to do to not feel like a failure, that’s different. It’s not a failure to struggle with something, even if it seems everyone else just “gets it”. It’s just human. You might be happier with more socializing, but you are fine and perfectly acceptable without it.

All that said, depression is also a liar. It will tell you that people don’t like you or at least don’t care. It will cherry-pick bad memories to drive a wedge between you and others to feed itself.

I hope at least some of this helps

Gale has a problem where he interprets interest in his backstory as romantic interest. Which is kind of realistic, but no one wants to be on the receiving end of that in real life or in a game.

Like bro, put your dick away and tell me some gossip about Mystra.

Not just Americans. You won’t even commonly see them in mainland Europe