<p>Addressing the high attrition rates in doctoral programs is crucial to enhancing the experiences of students who invest time and money in the degree, maximizing the efficient use of faculty and institutional resources, and enriching society with doctoral-credentialed experts. This interpretive phenomenological analysis presents data from <i>long hauler</i> students who nearly timed out of an Ed.D. program at a Midwest university yet persisted to complete their dissertations and graduate within the university’s seven-year completion window. Understanding their experiences can inform doctoral departments in all fields, and particularly in Ed.D. programs, about the pitfalls students typically encounter and, most importantly, how they can overcome them instead of dropping out of their program. In alignment with the literature on attrition and completion in doctoral programs, this study found that positive advisor-student relationships and consistent informal structure were essential during the dissertation-writing phase, when students no longer have the formal coursework organization to rely on for assignments and deadlines. The study also discusses the authors’ successful strategies for significantly decreasing their educational leadership department’s attrition figures, particularly closing the graduation gap between students of color and white students.</p>