Strained state of numbers at home without love (7)
I believe the answer is:
tension
'strained state' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'numbers at home without love' is the wordplay.
'numbers' becomes 'tens' (I have seen 'Cardinal numbers ' mean 'tens' so perhaps 'numbers' could also mean 'tens'**).
'at home' becomes 'in' ('in' can be similar in meaning to 'at home').
'without' means one lot of letters goes inside another ('without' can be similar in meaning to 'outside').
'love' becomes 'o' (In tennis, 'love' means 'zero').
'in' going around 'o' is 'ion'.
'tens'+'ion'='TENSION'
'of' is the link.
(Other definitions for tension that I've seen before include "One isn't (anag.)" , "A pulling strain" , "Stress, tautness" , "Stretched, uneasy, condition" , "Assay" .)