Is it normal that my daughter's shoes smell like death?

Sketchers brand shoes tend to get that really god-awful sewage smell. No one knows why. I would bet money that those are what your daughter has for shoes.

It is true that any pair of shoes will have some funk to them but Sketchers are the WORST. Washing them does not help. The only remedy is to stay away from that brand.

I have owned a couple pairs and both times - unbearable stink. ANY other shoe brand is fine.

On the subject of tennies, I recommend Saucony. Stylish, durable, excellent bargain, and no odors aside what is normal.

DIO has a valid point.
Its not people who smell bad, its the bacteria.
For some reason Asians dont have this problem.
As for ole stink foot.
1, 2 pairs of shoes.
one to wear, one in detox.
rotate daily.
2 The freezer kills most foot odor bacteria.
3 Soak feet weekly.( 20 min.)
Or as needed in a bleach water solution. It kills the funk and seams to prevent issues for a few days.
4 Antipersperant, buy a standard deodorant but use it on the feet.
if more is needed.
Degree brand clinical strength.
It cost more, but it can stop even the worst case.

Looks like someone needs multiple shoes

Does she wear the same shoes every day? What's the climate like where you live?

You're gonna have to shoot her. There's no other way.

If she’s 12, her body is probably changing. With these changes, like everyone else’s body, I imagine she probably sweats. A lot of people think that sweat is what causes feet or shoes to stink. Sweat itself causes no bad smells. Say for example someone’s feet have a stinky smell. It’s actually bacteria from socks and/or shoes and since feet have 250,000 sweat glands, bacteria gets attracted to this sweat and with bacteria attached to the sweat from wearing shoes or socks or both, that’s what causes feet to stink. When I played baseball, our coach always said it was healthy for our feet to stink. According to him, it broke in our shoes and it meant our feet were healthy. If her feet smell like ammonia or vinegar, that means she’s healthy. My best advice though, if it does start to become bothersome, tell her to wear another pair of shoes for a couple days to give time for the other ones to air out. Then keep switching back and forth every 3 days. If that doesn’t help just a little bit, it could be athletes feet or some kinda fungus. Remember showing every day does not get rid of foot fungus. Everybody has it and it’s normal. It’s normal for people’s feet to have a weird funky smell. Good luck.

I own own some nike basketball shoes I wear for work and holy fuck do they stink. I've never had stinky feet but those shoes are nasty!

Look into it more, dude. The example you give of them being so bad that you have to keep them outside is far from normal, and quite possibly indicative of an underlying cause.

The key is to let them dry out fully between uses. You can do this either by buying a second pair of shoes, and wearing them on alternate days, or by putting them somewhere warm and well-ventilated overnight.

You can also try sprinkling laundry stain remover (containing enzymes and sodium percarbonate) in the shoes.

Odour-eaters. You can get them from supermarkets. They're like shoe insoles - just slide them in.

Some people just create more stink. I used to look after a kid who had stinky feet and shoes at 18mths. I had never experienced that in such a young child before. He did only have the same one pair of shoes at a time, but even his sandals stank.

Have you tried sprinkling carb soda in her shoes? That's pretty good for absorbing odours in other places (eg fridges) so maybe it could work in shoes as well?

If the shoes and/or socks are synthetic that could be a contributing factor, because non-natural fabrics etc don't let the feet breathe as well as natural.

Our daughter is a few years younger than yours. Ours has some pretty serious BO issues, but foot odour doesn't seem - knock wood - to be a particular problem for her.

However, we know from talking to other parents of kids in roughly the same age cohort that some kids go through a phase when they're really, really stinky. I believe it's a hormonal thing, and girls seem to be just as bad - if not worse - that boys. Once the upheavals of puberty settle down, the stench should recede.

What we find odd about our daughter is that she's genuinely nose-blind when it comes to her BO. It's like she hasn't yet developed the olfactory sensors to detect her stink. This, too, is something we've heard from other parents about their kids.