How do I prevent the Darker Shade Box (color shift) around Vector Objects when Printing

Sorry in advance for the novelette. I am absolutely mystified and frustrated and would love some help! I've been working on this problem for about 30 hours over the last 4 days to figure out what the heck is happening and cannot find an answer through various forms of research.
Basically, when I print a JPEG, I am getting this area (a box) of darker shaded coloring around my heart and love text.  I've tested it a million different ways and am at a loss as to what the problem is ... is it an application problem, a color profile problem between my applications and printer, an improper way that I saved my file, etc.
Here is a photo I took of the image printed out (so it is slightly skewed from camera distortion):
The details:
(1) I create graphic art and sell it online. I save all of my printable art as JPEG files because of my customer base (diy hobbyists that print on their home printers without much knowledge base nor graphic design software).
(2) I use both Adobe Illustrator (AI) and Photoshop Elements 11 (PSE11) to design and save my artwork.
(3) I insert JPEG images into Microsoft Word 2003 documents to "test print" since most of my customers use home printers to print. Since most people have this basic software, it is a good gauge of the kind of print out they might get using the same or similar software.
(4) My PSE11 color profile setting is the default sRGB. I have test printed many times and I get the truest colors with this color profile.
(5) My AI color settings are normally also an sRGB color mode, but on occasion, I use a CMYK color mode if I am creating a larger document that I know the customer will need to take to a professional printer to print out.
(6) I do my home printing (for proofs) on an Epson Stylus Photo 1400 (which has the 6 color ink cartridges).
(7) Until this printing problem occurred on this test print out, I always used the "photo enhance" option when I designate settings for my printer via the Microsoft Word documents.
IMPORTANT: This is when I have the color shift?? or color rendering issues?? and it is the only time. If I use the regular ICM/ICC color profile of sRGB, the printing issue doesn't occur. Instead, I have a solid color background instead of this one with the strips of lighter color on the top and bottom.  However, I can't control how the customer prints, so I need to feel confident that whatever color profile setting they use, they will not run into this problem.  I even test printed the documents over at FedEx and the darker box/color shift did not occur.
(8) The document in question only has 3 sets of objects: the heart, the solid colored rectangle colored background and the text.  All 3 objects are vectors, they are at 100% opacity and there are no "special effects" applied.
(9) The image was entirely created in AI this time and exported as a maximum quality JPEG file, although you will see below that I tried many ways to create and save the file so that I didn't have the color band borders on top/bottom.
(10) I regularly use AI for part of my art, then I drag it to my PSE11 open document and it becomes a Vector Object (it cannot by copying/pasting into a PSE11 document).  I also regularly export AI images as PNG files, then insert them into an open PSE11 document. This printing issue has not occurred until recently.  Here is an example of a very complex AI image I created, then inserted into PSE11 just to add the background (the Teddy Bear and books are AI vector objects) that were exported as PNG files then inserted into PSE11 to integrate with the background image - I test printed with Photo Enhance and had no printing issues:
So, from the research I have done, it looks like it is a color rendering or color space issue with conflicting color profiles in the same document. I checked my color profile settings and both sRGB and CMYK were set to embed ICC color profiles.
I tried changing AI settings to Preserve Numbers (ignore linked profiles) for CMYK, but that didn't work.
I also checked and made sure that not only the document setup showed the sRGB color profile, but that all the objects within the document also were converted to sRGB as well for consistency. That didn't work.
I tried converting the document to CMYK along with the vector objects. That didn't work.
I tried saving the heart image as a PNG file alone, the "love" text as a PNG file alone, both the heart and text together as a PNG files alone. Once saved as PNG files, I inserted them into an open empty PSE11 document - as I normally do. I then added the background color I wanted. That didn't work - the print still showed the color changes.
I tried dragging each vector object separately and even as a group and got the same color change issue when printing.
I tried "expanding" and "outlining" the text before exporting as JPEG, before exporting as a PNG and before dragging as a vector object into PSE11. Expanding the text did not help the situation.
I tried exporting as Adobe PDF, then opening in PSE11, then resaving as JPEG. That didn't work.
I tried flattening transparency (even though there is no transparency in the AI file). That didn't work.
I tried rasterizing the image. That didn't work.
Thinking that the file might be corrupt, I started from scratch and redesigned the same heart and love text.  Unfortunately, I had the same problem as before.  At this point, my AI started becoming buggy and would not open new files. It happened repeatedly and I decided it was best to uninstall and reinstall AI (and maybe that would fix the problem).
I created just the heart in AI, then inserted it into an open PSE11 document (both after exporting as PNG and also by dragging as Vector Object from AI). It seemed to work. I could both drag the vector into PSE11 from AI and export from AI as a PNG, then insert into open PSE11 document with a background color - and it printed a solid background.
So, I thought that reinstalling and setting back to defaults worked. But, then I added the love text around the heart and tried exporting as JPEG files and the same problem continued to recur. Whether I dragged as a Vector object into PSE11 (the heart object and love text separately and also another time with the vector objects dragged as a group) or saved them as PNG files and inserted into PSE11 - I got the different shades of color on what should be a solid background. I even tried saving the PSE11 as a PSD file first, then resaving as JPEG and I tried saving as PNG and printing and this didn't help solve the problem.
I really think it is some color conflict issue but I can't figure it out. I am definitely not very knowledgeable about color profiles and how to sync all my devices, however, as I mentioned, this was not an issue until recently (and I think??? I recall changing the CMYK setting from Preserve Numbers to embed color profile a month or so ago - however, it should have been solved when AI went back to its defaults upon reinstall).
The reason I believe it is a color rendering/color space issue is because I could see the color output when I saved the JPEG with CMYK color profile versus sRGB color profile and the sRGB colors were much richer, not surprisingly. The top and bottom colors matched the sRGB printout and the middle darker box section matched the CMYK printout.
I am sure it is something fundamental or simple and I am completely overlooking it.  I wish it were just a transparency issue, because people know how to fix or do workarounds for it. But, there are no vector objects with any transparency ...
If I missed some detail, I apologize. Any help would be a dream come true at this point! lol
Thank you!

Okay, I got motivated to try again.  From doing a bit more research on troubleshooting AI printing problems, the Adobe article talks about print drivers. It was advised to uninstall and reinstall the print driver if the printing issue persists. So, I did. Unfortunately, I still had the same result after reinstalling and trying a test print! Ugh.
So, as Jacob said upfront, I seem to have an overactive print driver that is trying too hard (and it is a non-postscript printer which I realize is part of the problem).
There are so many variables in my situation as to how I create art and save/export art. I sometimes work solely in AI, sometimes solely in PSE and sometimes I use both programs to create. Consequently, I will:
(1) export directly from AI as JPEG if I am not adding PSE11 artwork.
(2) export directly from AI as PNG  if I plan on inserting that image into PSE11 to add to artwork I have created in PSE11.
(3) drag vector objects as a Smart Objects directly from AI to PSE11 to add to artwork I am creating in PSE11 if I know I will playing with the vector object and resizing in PSE11.
So, I did a test print using scenario 2, where I inserted the heart and love text PNG (AI created vector object) into an old PSE11 document. This old document already had a vector object from AI with a solid background and I knew it printed correctly. So, after inserting this new PNG from AI into this old document, it printed correctly using the photo enhance mode.
However, I haven't had a chance to actually create new art in the older AI files (that I know print properly), resave as something else and try another test print (either by exporting as JPEG and printing in Word or by exporting as PNG file and inserting into PSE11 document, then saving as JPEG and printing in Word).
After testing the different possibilities of ICM settings within my printer, I found that the JPEG images printed out with the truest colors and best quality if I simply selected "no color management" from the printer. Shocker, huh? lol
MY SOLUTION: So, what I think I will simply do is add an instruction sheet with the printables I sell, explaining that the color profile setting should never be handled by the printer so make sure to turn off color management by printer (and if they feel they must use the printer for color management, make sure the setting is sRGB since I embed that color profile in my JPEG's).
Edited to add: Since my issue was never about how I could print a successful image (I knew I could simply change the color profile settings), but rather about how to make sure that customers would get consistent and high quality print outputs of my digital images, this seems like the best approach.
I don't think I will every really know exactly why I am now getting color shifts in the "photo enhance" mode when I did not have this problem a couple months ago - applying the same methods of creating artwork. I was concerned that I was saving/exporting using incorrect or mismatched color settings or something of that nature.  However, since I went through the process of making my color spaces the same for everything, and I still have issue, clearly that is not the culprit. The only thing I can do to solve the problem and it is a straightforward solution anyway -> is to educate the buyer on how to print successfully (don't use photo enhance! ha ha).
Thanks again to everyone who chimed in and offered advice!

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