Do you think Zelda had faith in Link to find a way to restore her from her light dragon form someday from the moment she decided to eat the secret stone? I feel like this makes sense considering how much she loves him and how much she praises him in front of Rauru and Sonia. Also, Rauru and Sonia always expressed interest in helping her return to her own time, so I'm positive they would never have allowed her to become (or rather stay) an immortal dragon; they knew how much she loved Link and wanted to make sure she would be with him. So many people read the final memory as Zelda definitively and permanently for real sacrificing her humanity to save Hyrule, and I feel like they don't take her love for Link into account enough.
i have a LOT of thoughts about this!
for starters, i think zelda's decision is one of utmost selflessness. when she swallows the stone, she is not thinking about the fact that she will lose herself. she is not thinking about herself at all. all she cares about is restoring the master sword so that link will be able to use it in the future to stop ganon once and for all. she knows that she will be "forever changed" if she goes through with it, but it doesn't matter to her one bit.
her faith in link is incredibly strong. personally, i think zelda wasn't even concerned with whether or not he'd be able to change her back. she had full faith in him and the fact that he'd be able to use the sword one day to save the world, and that was why she went through with it. this is why i see it as a true sacrifice on her part. she is giving up herself in order to help both link and hyrule as a whole.
when zelda swallows the stone, it is after the imprisoning war. both rauru and sonia are gone at that point. had they been alive, i think they would've understood her logic and reasoning behind the decision, but maybe disagreed with it because dragonification was a forbidden act. i don't know if they'd try and stop her. zelda knows that she is the only one with the ability to restore and protect the master sword. without it, any future battle against ganon will be lost.
i think the main thing that drives her (and her ultimate decision) is love. specifically, her love for link. all she wants is to be able to return to her time, to him, but she is effectively stuck 10,000 years in the past and can't seem to find her way back. by choosing to swallow her stone, it shows just how much she loves him. she waited 100 years for him. what's 10,000 more?
she had faith that he would find her. she had faith that he would be able to use the sword to defeat ganon. she didn't know if she'd ever be freed from her dragon form, but to zelda, it was a sacrifice that she was more than willing to make. it was a decision that was so easy because of how much she loves him, and how much she trusts him.
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