Bella's Breaking Dawn Decision, Warning: BREAKING DAWN SPOILER!

"Is Bella right to want to die with Edward at the end of Breaking Dawn, even if it means leaving her daughter behind?"

During Breaking Dawn, Bella faces a situation no mother or wife would ever want to live through: Does she fight for her daughter, Renesmee, giving her the chance to escape, though she herself will almost surely die with her husband, leaving her daughter parentless?; or does she escape with her daughter, leaving her husband and family to die and to exist in guilt forever? For Bella, it is a decision she never wanted to make, but one she found herself with no way out of at the ending of Breaking Dawn.

In the end, Bella makes the decision to stay behind to fight and most likely to die with her husband, Edward, leaving her daughter to escape with Jacob Black. She chooses to sacrifice her own existence and her husband’s so that Renesmee can carry on living. Although this seems a truly noble and self-sacrificing thing to do, is it a completely justified decision?

Although Bella chooses with the best intentions at heart, (by staying behind to fight, she will give her daughter a better chance of survival), Renesmee will be left with no one in the world, but her trusty werewolf, Jacob Black. It seems that the better alternative would have been for Bella, Edward, Jacob and Renesmee to escape, thus leaving Renesmee with her parents and her imprinted werewolf. This surely would give Renesmee the best upbringing possible with the people she loves, but this is not how Bella chooses.

To justify Bella’s choice, we have to look at the complicated love she has for her daughter, Renesmee, and her husband, Edward. Edward is, as Bella often quotes, “the one thing she could not live without.” However, when she discovers her pregnancy, she describes how her love for Edward does not lessen, but that her heart merely expands to provide the same amount of love for her unborn child. She ends up with two things that she could no longer live without. When it becomes clear towards the end of Breaking Dawn that the only way to solve the ‘immortal child’ misunderstanding is a fight to death between the Volturi, Bella knows she could not bear her daughter to die, nor could she bear to live without Edward, even if her daughter lived. She is also positive that Edward would not abandon his family again to fight alone, especially when, unlike in Eclipse, it is certain that the majority of the Cullens and those assisting them would die. Bella is not a coward; she would not abandon her new family either, nor the people who are giving their lives to protect her daughter.

Due to this, she has only one option left that is truly bearable for her: she must give her daughter the best chance of survival by fighting alongside her husband, family and friends, even if it means that she herself may die. Bella would never leave Edward to fight alone. In the end, it only makes sense that she must die with Edward, (as she cannot live without him), and let her daughter live,( even though she will be alone), because knowing her daughter was dead whilst she and Edward lived would destroy her and living with her daughter whilst Edward was dead would do likewise.

In conclusion, it is not so much that Bella wants to die with Edward rather than escaping with her beloved daughter. She makes her decision based on what she could bear. Bella would rather die with Edward, knowing her daughter was safe, than to live without one or the other.

I can see why Bella chose to stay behind with Edward and the rest of the Cullens to fight, but I wonder whether part of this decision is also due to feeling a little guilty knowing that the Volturi are coming because of the existence of her and Edwards' daughter, Renesmee. Of course she'd never leave Edward but at the same time she'd never have been able to live with herself if she'd abandoned the Cullens to fight alone for her.

I agree, i believe she stayed partly because of the guilt. Throughout the whole series, the Cullens have done nothing but care for Bella. She owes them so much for the amount of times they've saved her life, shown her kindness, bought her things (despite her protests) and loved her and accepted her into their family.

So after all that, does she really have a choice in leaving them to be with her daughter? Sure, she loves her too, but there are so many factors against the decision to go with Renesmee, she couldn't really leave.

I see your point about the guilt; I completely agree that it was definitely part of it. However, I think the main reason is that, as a mother, the thing Bella wants the most above anything is her daughter's safety. She cannot leave Edward and the Cullens to fight alone because her gift is such an immense edge for them and she loves them too much, but she also cannot keep her daughter with her. So really, she almost HAS to stay to fight with the Cullens and giving Renesmee to Jacob will ensure her daughter's safety too.

Another reason why she stayed of course, is because she wanted to shield her family and her fellow vampires.

The way she saw it was, if she could shield the Vampires from Jane and Alec, they had a chance of not only killing the twins but Demitri as well. Edward said that he was going to fight Demitri to protect Alice and the others and I think that Bella was thinking that if he could take Demitri out, even if she died, Edward could find Renesmee eventually. She knew that even if Alice didn't come back, if Alice was looking into Bella's future, she could find Renesmee and Jacob and they along with Jasper could be reunited. Also, if Bella had died and Alice did this, any surviving members of the Cullens could be contacted and escape to Rio as well, as long as Demitri had been killed.

I see your point about the guilt as well, but I think that Bella probably considered what I said and believed that any living Cullens could be contacted but Alice and Jasper, or even Jacob. So, if Bella died, the chances are that all of the other [or most] of the Cullens could reunite.

However, I think that this was a horrible choice she had to make but she held her own during the confrontation and shielded everybody magnificently.

I completely agree with you except I'll just say I wrote this thinking of Bella when she first goes to J.Jenks (probably should've made that clearer), so at the time she hadn't mastered the shielding.

It definitely would've been a reason to stay because obviously she loves her family, but she wouldn't know for sure if she could shield them.
She still would've wanted to go after the twins though.

Do you think, if it had turned to a fight, that Bella would've been able to destroy the twins?

Demetri was the problem. If there wouldn't be him then they all would run and hide.

I see Bella's point. She is mother who doesn't want that her child dies, she wants to protect her, to give her chance to live even if she have to die for giving Renesmee this chance.

Yes, they would run away, Bella could run with her daughter but here's the point - she agreed to have vampire life only because she wanted to be with Edward for forever and forever.

It's seems that there isn't any good way how to stay together all three, at least the ends were good and Bella shouldn't loose her life and her Renesmee.

Witch twins didn't seem like to much of fighters to me. They were only using their powers, so I think they never really needed to use their fighting skills and they shouldn't have many in that point. They trusted to their powers that there won't be anyone who would stand there like nothing happens but Bella does and shield her friends.

I agree with all of the above and I also think that as long as Renesme survived Bella would be happy, going on the theory that Bella felt that it meant that part of Edward and herself carried on and with someone who loved her as much as they did.

The Twins wouldn't stand a chance

Alice, I think that she might have been able to because not only was Bella a newborn with extra strength, I think she commented on how Jane and Alec would have only recieved basic training and were not fighters. I think this would have been in Bella's advantage because she was shielding herself and everybody else so she would have been targeted first. Jane probably hated being rendered nearly powerless and would probably attack Bella so she would drop the sheild and then she could hurt her with her power.

Didn't Zafrina say she'd cover Bella and help her as well?
Because if this was the case, I think it would be very likely that the twins could be destroyed.

As well, I don't know about Bellas decision before she was able to shield her family, but I think she probably just trusted Alice.

Since Alice had left her all these clues, maybe she felt like she had seen that the Cullens were going to lose, but she felt that she had to fight and help because she took herself and Edward out of a battle before. She may have also been determined to kill Demitri if Edward failed, so Alice, Jasper, Renesmee and Jacob along with any survivors would be safe.

I don't know, does that make any sense?

I think I should've rephrased the question but I didn't want to upset people

I was thinking, would Bella be able to destroy the twins without getting herself destroyed immediately afterwards?

I agree with everyone that Bella could definitely destroy the twins easy, but I think she probably would've got taken down afterwards pretty quickly. The Volturi would have been devastated to have lost their main offensive weapons.

However, maybe if Zafrina could blind the rest of the Volturi and then Edward could take out Demetri, Bella would survive.

I'm one of those people who would've liked Breaking Dawn to turn into a fight, but the Cullens magically win with no casualites. Even if it's completely absurd and ridiculous and would never have happened, I would've enjoyed Bella's arse-kicking of the Volturi (excuse the phrase) anyway

I get you Alice, I mean how many fights have the Cullens been in!?
I mean, in these books which span over about a year and a half they kill Victoria, James, Laurent (I mean he was involved even though the Werewolves took care of him), Riley, the newborn Vampires, and get into all these fights but have no casulties. I mean, they were all pretty serious, especially with the Volturi, I mean they run into them THREE TIMES (I'm including when Jane comes after the Newborn Vampires are destroyed by the Cullens) and two of these times they are debating whether to kill one or all of the Cullens and Bella. I mean, how is it that the Cullens are able to defeat and talk their way out of all these situations with any fighting where they are actually in trouble?

I'm not sure if Bella could have defeated the twins and not died after but I think she probably could. I mean none of their mental attacks are working, so the Volturi who attack mentally have to actually attack and they are not trained like that (with the exception of Demitri but to be honest I think that Edward could take him and another two or three vampires on the Cullens side were willing to help). If Zafrina blinded the Volturi, however, then I think a fight could be easily won. Jasper and Emmett with Carlisle and some others from different Covens could have taken the fighter and the Volturi who attack mentally were at a disadvantage and they all would be blind thanks to Zafrina. Bella could easily take out both Jane and Alec even if she didn't have help which she would.

I think it would have been sensible for Zafrina and Bella to sit out of the fight once Zafrina blinded them. This would stop either of them losing their concentration or getting killed and would enable the rest of the 'good' vampires to take out the Volturi. I think this would be a very good plan and would end in a wi for the Cullens without any losses to their numbers.

Have to say as much as I wanted Bella to tear Jane a new one I still loved the way they managed to talk their way out of a potentially fatal situation.

While a fight would have been great I'm one of those people that was traumatized by the masacre that was the last Harry Potter and cant help but feel that deaths in the final book forever taint a series when you revist it later.

I love the hidden politics going on in the vampire world and adore the way Stephenie exploited the tentative rule that the Volturi have over the other vampires, especially the way she highlights Edward's mind reading talents.

There was a fight going on at the end of that book it was just a mental one and all the more tense for it.

It would be hard as well to read about a fight scene, especially one that Bella is involved in, because the writing would get very full and confusing. We'd only be able to read as much as Bella was aware of so if Bella died at some point, the book would just stop there unless it swtiched back to Edwards POV or somebody elses.

And then that really unhappy ending with everybody dying because Bella died would happen.
I can't remember which forum it was in, but i was depressing

i understand bellas decision and if i found myself in that situation i would of done the same her daughter will be loved by jacob and she knows he will keep her safe ,she stands at edwards side and is prepared to die with him to go into the next life with him which i thought was a true testament to how strong the bond was between them

[FONT=Courier][COLOR=orange]i think that Bella made the right decision. She chose to stand and be loyal to her family and ensure that Nessie had a good person in Jacob to go with so she would be protected. Her decision also made sure that she was with Edward to the potential 'end'.