Uncertain Diagnosis. Neurological Cause? Absence of Ear Wax?

Hi, everybody. I'm posting this for my wife who has ear problems. It's still unclear exactly what is going on so I'm not sure what section to post this in. This has been plaguing her for 10-15 years. I'm not sure if it's hyperacusis, tinnitus or something else. Her right ear regularly has a bad reaction to sounds. Particularly voices, her own voice included. When she listens to music on headphones, it's the vocal parts that cause the reaction. She has no hearing loss and her problem doesn't make things seem "too loud" or painful as with hyperacusis. She also doesn't hear any constant sounds in her ears either like with tinnitus. It's only a REACTION to certain sounds, and only sometimes. She can go a number of days where her ear feels fine and then all of a sudden, it starts reacting again. No discernible pattern to it.

It's also very hard for her to describe it. It seems she's maybe hearing some kind of extra sound that's occurring in her ear as it reacts to the external sound, but she's even uncertain about that. It's like maybe something in between a sound and a feeling, if that makes sense? I've tried asking her if any of the regular words accurately describe it. Rustling, whooshing, crackling, popping, ringing, pulsing, screeching, etc. But she says it's not any of those. She says it's sort of similar to the sound of wind in her ear, but not a whooshing. Her inability to accurately describe it is making it difficult to diagnose. An ENT had no answers for her and referred her to an Audiologist who ran a number of tests and said everything was normal. No hearing loss or other problems found. She gave us a pamphlet for hyperacusis which is what led me here.

A few other things of note. One unusual thing is she has NO EAR WAX at all in either of her ears. Just a little bit of dry flaky stuff on occasion but nothing like the wax I have in my ears. She says her ears feel naked and unprotected in this way. Like the missing wax might be part of the problem. Her ears are very sensitive to wind with cold wind causing pain in her ears. She has to cover them in any kind of windy environment. Again, she feels like if she had some normal wax in there, she wouldn't be so sensitive. Her ears feel very dry all the time and can get itchy regularly. It seems like all of this must have something to do with the sound reaction problems in her right ear in some way, but neither the ENT or Audiologist have any ideas about it. I've seen people on this forum talk about how they think ear wax makes their problem worse but could the opposite also be true? Could a complete absence of ear wax be a sign of a problem that is making the ears more sensitive? I have lots of ear wax and no problems with my ears, so I have to wonder about this.

Another thing is that she recently went to a physical medicine doctor for some problems with her legs and feet. The doctor did some reflex tests and thought she might have some neurological problems. She ordered a brain MRI to look for possible mild, undiagnosed cerebral palsy. I'm wondering if any neurological problems she might have could also be contributing to this ear problem. I've seen the word "myoclonus" mentioned on this forum. The test that prompted the MRI request was an ankle clonus test, which she apparently reacted to.

So regarding the MRI, what else do we need to have them look for regarding her ears in addition to the possible cerebral palsy? It would be best to check for everything at once as I've also read here the MRIs can be very uncomfortable for people with ear problems. People are saying MRIs can actually make hearing problems worse, which is a scary thought. Overall, it seems rather hopeless with none of these doctors so far having any answers. It sounds like there's not much you can do for a problem like this. But then, it's still unclear exactly what the problem even is. I'm hoping the MRI will shed some light on all of this. Has anyone actually had an MRI reveal anything about their ear problems?