Begging doctors for tests, I worried that I was missing something and heading for an early death. Would understanding the roots of my health anxiety lead me to a cure?

Throughout my adolescence and into my mid-20s, I spent a lot of time trying to understand my body. I was unwell, that much was certain. The question of exactly what was wrong with me was one to which I applied myself studiously. I had theories, of course. Looking back, these tended to change quite frequently, and yet the fear was always the same: in short, that I was dying, that I had some dreadful and no doubt painful disease that, for all my worrying, I had carelessly allowed to reach the point at which it had become incurable.

This started at university, when I developed a headache that didn’t go away. The pain wasn’t severe, but it was constant – accompanied by a strange feeling of belatedness that told me it had already been going on for some time. How long, exactly, I couldn’t say – weeks, definitely. Maybe it had been years.

Using money to break up a relationship, particularly one with children, is not loving behaviour. You have to take control of your own life

I have been with my partner for 14 years and we have two small children together. I have always had a complicated relationship with my mother, who was a stern disciplinarian when I was growing up, and is deeply sensitive and lacks social confidence. I too am probably overly sensitive and get anxious.

My partner believes that my mother doesn’t think she is good enough for me. There have been numerous hints that this is the case, and she recently told me she was surprised when I started a relationship with someone whom she considers to be of “a different class”.

Opposition activists and journalists explain why the Orbánisation of the US may fail and how a former ally could end the Hungarian PM’s 15-year reign

On a sunny April afternoon in Budapest, a handful of reporters crowded around the back entrance of the Dorothea, a luxury hotel tucked between a Madame Tussauds waxworks museum and a discount clothing store in the city’s walking district.

Most had spent hours outside the hotel, hoping to confirm reports that Donald Trump Jr was inside. News of his visit had leaked two days earlier, but much of his agenda remained shrouded in secrecy, save for a meeting with the Hungarian foreign minister.

Chef and restaurateur Stevie Parle takes to London’s theatreland with yet another sterling performance to add to his CV: a great first act, a strong middle section and a thoroughly satisfying denouement

Off to Town this week, on Drury Lane. Yes, a restaurant called Town, one word, so a bit of a challenge to find online. Then again, perhaps by the time you’re as experienced and beloved a restaurateur as Stevie Parle, formerly of Dock Kitchen, Craft, Sardine, Palatino and Joy, your regular clientele will make the effort to find you. Parle’s shtick, roughly speaking, is thoughtful, high-end Mediterranean cooking and warm, professional hospitality, so the longer I thought about him opening a new place in London’s theatre heartland and calling it just Town, the more it made sense.

Yes, Town may be up at the less pretty end of this famous road, next door to a Travelodge and in the shadow of the lesser-known Gillian Lynne theatre, but whenever I hear the words “Drury Lane”, I’m whisked back to the impossible glamour of the start of the Royal Variety Performance on the BBC and people in tiaras exiting Rolls-Royces. Drury Lane, the commentator used to say, was the glitzy epicentre of London town, and Parle’s new restaurant certainly captures some of the essence of that yesteryear ritz. It’s a big, beautiful, ballsy, expensive-looking beast; a sleek, capacious, ever-so-slightly Austin Powers-esque, shiny-floored, caramel-coloured pleasure palace. It has a vivid, neon-green brightly lit open kitchen and thick 3D burgundy wall tiles that speak of expensive ceramic deliveries from the genre of Italian supplier that makes Kevin McCloud clutch his face and sigh, “Well, this spells problems for the budget.”

The US president’s strange mix of weakness and anti-Beijing hostility may be pushing Xi Jinping towards a fateful decision

The belief that bad things come in threes is an old superstition with scant basis in fact. Still, in these disordered times, it’s natural to wonder whether war in Europe and the Middle East will be followed by war in Asia. Nuclear-armed India and Pakistan, firing off insults and missiles, recently demonstrated how real that prospect is. Emboldened by its alliance with Russia, North Korea’s unpredictable rogue regime threatens almost everyone.

Yet it is China’s accelerating confrontation with US-backed Taiwan that forms the most alarming panel in this gloomy Asian triptych. China’s president, Xi Jinping, has reportedly told his generals to be ready by 2027 to conquer the self-governing island, which he regards as stolen sovereign territory. US officials warned last week that China already has sufficient capability to invade now, with amphibious landing craft, D-day-style floating docks, paratroopers and expanded air combat and missile forces in a constant state of readiness.

Simon Tisdall is a Guardian foreign affairs commentator

This complex, precise German true crime drama about the real-life killing of two young women is painstaking in its detail. Its pleasure lies in watching the detectives slowly reveal the truth

It’s never a good sign, is it, to see a young woman going for a run in the woods at the start of a gritty European crime drama? The Black Forest Murders takes the real-life killing of two young women in the south of Germany as its basis, and turns it into an extremely thorough police procedural. The detective work here is complex, precise and painstaking, and there is a sense that the film-makers have no wish to spare viewers any of the intense slog it takes to track down the perpetrator (if indeed the police manage to do so).

Nina Kunzendorf is senior detective Barbara Kramer, who grew up in the area but moved to Berlin to make her name in the police force. Now that her father is getting older, and more infirm, she has moved back to her (fictional) small, rural home town in the south, where she is treated as an outsider. Kramer seems like a loner, smokes a lot and is the sort of cop who will slam down the phone when she doesn’t like what she’s hearing on the other end of it. She is your classic TV lead detective. The force at her command are local people who have remained local, and they largely resent her Berlin ways and lack of community knowhow. But she, too, is contemptuous of their amateur methods, small-town gossip and the low hum of sexism that threatens to rear its head again and again. It’s a standard culture-clash setup.

Industry giant paid for Lord Vaizey’s trip to Switzerland before he tabled amendment to tobacco and vapes bill

A Conservative peer proposed delaying the UK’s proposed ban on heated tobacco, weeks after a leading cigarette company paid for him to visit its research facility in Switzerland.

The tobacco and vapes bill would gradually raise the age at which consumers can buy cigarettes and other tobacco products, making the UK the first major economy to chart a course towards phasing out tobacco altogether.

At least seven killed as Moscow-bound passenger service hits overhead bridge that fell on tracks, while a freight train derails as span gives way underneath

Seven people were killed and dozens injured after bridges collapsed in two separate Russian regions bordering Ukraine overnight, officials said on Sunday, with rail authorities blaming at least one incident on “illegal interference”.

In Russia’s Bryansk region, a road bridge collapsed on to a railway line late on Saturday, derailing a passenger train heading to Moscow and killing seven people.

‘Prior associations’ appear to cost billionaire the chance to be Nasa administrator, as US president says new nominee ‘will be mission aligned’

The White House has withdrawn Jared Isaacman as its nominee for Nasa administrator, abruptly yanking a close ally of Elon Musk from consideration to lead the space agency.

Donald Trump said he would announce a new candidate soon. “After a thorough review of prior associations, I am hereby withdrawing the nomination of Jared Isaacman to head Nasa,” the US president posted online. “I will soon announce a new Nominee who will be mission aligned, and put America first in space.”

Israel and US envoy reject group’s proposal to free 10 living hostages and 18 bodies in exchange for release of Palestinian prisoners

Hamas said on Saturday that it had submitted its response containing some amendments to a proposal presented by Donald Trump’s Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, to mediators, the most concrete sign of progress towards a ceasefire since March.

The Palestinian group said in a statement that under the deal, it will release 10 living hostages and 18 bodies in return for Israel’s release of Palestinian prisoners – a change to the US’s latest proposal that will make it more difficult for Israel to resume fighting if talks on a permanent ceasefire are not completed by the end of the truce.