--is what is called "stocking glove"--symptoms appear first in the parts of the body farthest from the center, due to the fact that in chronic, slowly progressive neuropathies, nerves tend to "die back" from the parts hardest to get nutrients/oxygen to and toxins out of--it's hardly the only presentation. Many people, especially those with with acute or sub-acute onset, report symptoms in various other parts of the body. I am one of those--my acute onset burning small-fiber sensory neuropathy did start in my right foot, but spread to almost every corner of my body within ten days. Though it took me months to get to specialists at Cornell-Weill Center who actually 1) did not discount my symptoms, and 2) could test for damage to small fibers by skin biopsy, which confirmed widespread damage to those fibers which subsume the sensations of pain and temperature, I was fortunate that the Neurontin I was put on did start to work quickly enough that I was functional within several weeks. Then, I was able to do enough research to realize that though all my tests had been negative/normal to that point, they had not been anywhere near extensive enough, and that's why I eventually went to Cornell-Weill. (Small fiber dysfunction cannot be detected through standard nerve conduction studies or EMG, as these are only gross enough to measure wide-scale dysfunction of larger, myelinated nerves.) Before those weeks, though--imagine a sunburn all over your body that's been rubbed with steel wool. And that included the face and scalp.

I would strongly suggest you look at the www.lizajane.org spreadsheets--a number of us worked with Liza Jane in helping to put together this long but extremely useful way to monitor just about every test for neural dysfunction we could think of/find out about--to see just how thorough your testing has been; if you're like most, I bet you've just been through the tip of the iceberg.

Also, in the Useful Websites section, there are numerous good articles about neuropathy types and testing. The Triehaft article gives a very good overview of small-fiber neuropathy in particular:

http://www.thecni.org/reviews/13-2-p07-treihaft.htm

And, since you mention face/lips--one fo the most common culprits for those type of symptoms is neuropathy due to celiac/gluten sensitivity or vitamin deficiencies from that--make sure you get tested for those levels.