How does soft water make skin soft?

Answer 1

I'm wondering this same thing. Supposedly soft water is good for your skin but everytime I'm at someone's house who has a water softener I find that my hands feel slick after washing them and then within a few hours of having washed my hands they begin to itch and peel. Both my parents and my friends have a water softener and I've had this experience at both places. I've also showered at my parents house using my bath soap (ivory) and found their water to irritate the heck out of my skin (dryness and itching).

This happens almost every time I was my hands with soft water and never otherwise. I wonder if it's the salt content of the water.

Funny thing is, I grew up with soft water (again, parents have it) but now after using 'regular' water for years and years the soft water seems to just irritate the heck out of my skin. I'd actually like to have a water softener but am not about to pay that kind of money for something that sure seems to irritate my skin.

Answer 2

My opinion is that the soft water gives you an incomplete rinse of the soap and that the soft sodium in the soft water reacts with the lanolin on the skin and actually produces kind of a film of soap on your body.