[Marilyn]

If you do want a softener, and it's too costly to pipe the drinking water separate from the rest of the house, I believe a reverse osmosis system on the drinking water will remove the sodium. We don't have a softener, but do have a reverse osmosis unit at our kitchen sink to remove the contaminants from our drinking water. I believe it removes almost everything. The water is very clear and clean looking and it tastes great!! Our RO unit is made by Kinetico. You can get filter units for it that will add calcium back in if you want to, but I haven't bothered with this.

Not sure where you live, but where we are, people run separate outside water lines that come off before the softener so that they have hard water to water the lawn with. You will want to be able to use soft water to wash the car though.

Hope this helps in some way!!