After a missing 77-year-old Summit Township woman was found safe, a family and the surrounding neighborhood are breathing a sigh of relief.

Cathie Kremenik gave her family quite the scare last week.

“I’m happy to be home. Believe me I’m happy to be home,” said Cathie Kremenik, Summit Township resident.

Kremenik’s family said she’s been showing signs of mental decline and when she didn’t come home Friday night, they knew something was wrong.

She doesn’t have a cell phone, so loved ones tried to retrace her steps without luck. State police issued a missing endangered persons advisory. 15 Hours later, Kremenik used her bank card.

“That’s when we discovered there was activity not at 9 a.m. but at 10:20 a.m. when my mother stopped in Painesville, Ohio to pay for some gas,” said Barbara Walker, Cathy Kremenik’s daughter.

Kremenik said she got lost and confused, telling her family she kept driving, hoping to find her way back home but she ended up in Parkersburg, West Virginia.

After driving about 800 miles in 21 hours without sleep, Kremenik finally asked some good samaritans for help at a rest stop.

“I’m honestly speechless. I mean, we had to go all the way to West Virginia unexpectedly,” said Carson Walker, Cathy Kremenik’s grandson.

Those good samaritans called police. This was her face when a police officer told Kremenik where she was.

“She just looked right at her and she said ‘Barb, this isn’t my fault. I got on the road, I was looking for our house, and the road never ended,'” said Jill Friend, Cathie’s neighbor.

It was a wake-up call for Kremenik’s loved ones.

“We had no idea how bad she was until this happened,” said Sue Berdis, Cathie’s neighbor.

“There was a happy ending and that’s not always the case,” Walker said.

Now, they’re urging others to be on the lookout for early signs of dementia.

“If you see somebody that’s confused, don’t be afraid to call 911. Just call,” said Lana Pepperman, Cathie’s neighbor.

“As far as I’m concerned in how I’ve always known my mother, she walks on water and can part the seas and the denial that sometimes we can decline, as a family unit it’s hard to accept,” Walker went on to say.

Walker told us her mother has an appointment later this week to find treatments for the condition she now faces.