LoadingLoadingLoadingLoadingOnline doctoral candidates report isolation that a campus coffee queue used to interrupt. This study, with FollowLap counselling partners, maps what the university may do: structured peer groups, supervisor training on distress signals, and referral — not diagnosis. Candidates with a monthly peer writing group had lower intention to withdraw. Groups that were unsupervised chat rooms did not. FollowLap University should staff doctoral community as academic infrastructure. A global digital doctorate that only sends login details is negligent about the human cost of distance.