Just wanted to hop in and give ya'll some support too.
I'm Vera, and I was due Sept 10, 2004. My water broke June 24, 2004, and DS came June 27 - 29w4d gestation. He came out screaming, thanks to steroids! He came home at 33w3d gestation, and he's now a healthy and BIG 22 month old.
I see regular newborns now and they actually look small! It's amazing. He was 3 lbs 13.4 oz at birth (big for a 29 weeker), and regular newborns looked huge at the time, but now they seem so itty bitty. Neat how your perspective changes.
We had the normal preemie issues... learning to do oral feedings (went home 100% breastfed with a nipple shield), apnea (both sleeping and eating - the eating ones kept him in a few days longer), jaundice, etc. And later when he was 9 months, he was diagnosed with anemia. Don't forget to get your preemies' iron levels checked later on!!!
I remember the day we went to pick him up. We went in the afternoon, because I had a baby shower that morning (knowing I'd not be out of the house for a few weeks, this was the best time to do it). When we walked in the room, DS was laying in an open crib with NO monitors attached to him. I was freaked! After all the apnea episodes, I was thinking "What if he'd had apnea this morning and the nurses hadn't noticed?", since he'd been disconnected from monitors all day. It was just so scary to me. But thankfully, I got over it and brought my baby boy home. He had ONE apnea episode while feeding that first night, and that was really scary. But after that, he never had one again!
Oh, and he also had reflux, which is common in preemies, and I've read it's also common in women who had antibiotics before/during labor (with PPROM, I obviously had antibiotics). So we treated him with regular reflux meds (Zantac and Prevacid at two different times - get FLAVORED meds), and then I finally read about probiotics, and that ended up getting him off the reflux meds. So it's worth trying if you're dealing with reflux! May or may not work for you, but it doesn't hurt to try it and give them some good flora for their gut.
I hope you all will have your babies home soon, and that you won't have any long term health issues to deal with. It's scary to have a preemie. Hugs to all of you.