IN THREE short years, Aoife has watched her daughter change beyond all recognition. It began with drug experimentation but quickly progressed to gang-involvement on Dublin's northside.

Elaine started smoking hash at 13 but within a year she was snorting cocaine. She hasn't yet turned 17 yet her mother fears a bleak future for her eldest child. "She doesn't think her drug use is a problem but it's made her very aggressive and violent. She starts screaming and biting her knuckles when we're having a row. It's going to take something drastic to happen to get her to wake up." But more worrying than her daughter's continuous use of cocaine, ecstasy and aerosols is her affiliation with a local gang. "They're a heavy gang. They sell heroin and cocaine and go joyriding and hold-up shops. Every day I get up and I don't know what to expect. She's run away loads of times."

Elaine's behaviour has led to some scrapes with the law. "She nearly hospitalised a young one a while back. When she gets violent, she gets violent. She had a good upbringing. She didn't learn that behaviour at home."

'There is no help for these kids' Aoife has tried, and continues to try, to get her daughter help.

On dozens of occasions she's brought her down to Addiction Response Crumlin (Arc), the community group that offers a range of support and holistic services for drug-users, but Elaine isn't interested. "She says she doesn't have a problem, she can stop whenever she wants and we're the ones with the problem.

There's no talking to her."

Aoife has two younger children and is becoming concerned that they may begin to mimic their sister's behaviour. "One of them is about to start secondary school so it's a worry because that's where all Elaine's problems began. She's barely living in the house anymore and maybe it would be best if she was gone altogether. I've neglected the other two a bit and have taken out my anger and frustrations about her out on them. I'm at my wit's end." It has also affected her health; she now suffers from panic attacks and anxiety from the continuous strain.

In order to recover from drugs, Aoife knows her daughter must want help but maintains there still aren't enough services for children abusing drugs other than heroin. "Unless you have a needle in your arm, there is no help for these kids. But it's cocaine and ecstasy the kids are doing nowadays, not heroin."

Jimmy Norman couldn't agree more. As project leader of Ciall youth project, a service for 12to 18-year-olds with drug problems that operates out of Arc, he has firsthand knowledge about the popularity of cocaine with youngsters in Crumlin. "One of the problems is that they see alcohol, cannabis and cocaine as 'ok' drugs that won't do them any harm. But they see heroin as 'not ok' and say they'd never touch it. And the reason a lot of them do coke is so they can stay awake and keep drinking."

The quantities of drugs they're able to consume is also disquieting. "Some of them would smoke 25 worth of cannabis on a daily basis.

And some of them would snort 500 worth of coke between two or three of them on a Saturday night if they were bingeing. These are kids of 14 and 15."

To afford this lifestyle, these teenagers are getting involved with gangs and drug dealing. "And if we thought they had problems before, that's where things really go wrong, " Norman says.

"This is not just a problem isolated to Crumlin . . . it's happening in Tallaght, Clondalkin and other places too."

Children and teenagers who access Ciall youth project, where they can avail of alternative therapies like acupuncture and Indian head massage, as well as one-on-one confidential counselling, tell tales of children aged nine smoking hash and 10and 11-year-olds snorting coke. "What I hear from them is beyond belief. If we had more government funding, we could be doing a lot more to help here. So far, the government has only made a token gesture to tackle the problem with cocaine amongst our kids. But pretty soon they won't be able to ignore it."

Children dabbling with cocaine quickly develop into addicted adults. Croi Nua, which also operates out of Arc, is the state's only treatment facility for crack-cocaine and cocaine addicts. People are presenting with 1,000-a-day habits and with huge abcesses from injecting cocaine. "You get a better hit that way and there is a high injecting culture in the Dublin 12 area.

People are losing limbs from injecting cocaine, " explains Rachel Cahill, project leader since the programme began in September. She's treated prostitutes, businessmen and watched people lose everything . . . from their homes to their jobs to their lives . . . to drug debts. That's where Arc's bereavement support service and family support network comes into play. "We're always trying to predict what services are needed. At the moment, we have concerns that the market will be flooded with crystal meth, which is highly addictive, " according to Susan Collins, coordinator of the centre.

Crystal meth is a highly addictive amphetamine, known as the 'poor man's cocaine'. Smoking or injecting the drug brings on a feeling of exhilaration and a sharpening of focus that can last for hours. It has already made an impact in the US and more recently it has made inroads in the UK.

"The drug scene is so unpredictable, we just try to be here, " says Collins, who explains that Arc takes a "body, mind and soul" approach to rehabilitating people. "But we're a community group and not receiving half the funding we need. But as the cocaine problem continues to explode, it is going to cost the government millions in future because they're ignoring it now."

'Arc has given me hope for the first time' Patricia and Joe are recovered addicts who take part in education and training programmes at Arc. "I started smoking hash and taking heroin around the same time when I was 14, " says Patricia. "Then at 14-and-a-half I dropped out of school. When I first started taking drugs, I really took everything and anything . . . heroin and cocaine mainly. I'm in my late 20s now and I took drugs altogether for about 10 years.

"I started getting treatment here a few years ago when I finally got older and wiser and I love it here. If I hadn't got into this centre, I don't think I'd be here. The reason a lot of people got addicted to heroin years back is because of the rave scene. People would do loads of E's and then take heroin to come down. They didn't know how addictive it was.

"The great thing about this place is all the course and education you can do. I've done computer courses, artwork courses and Maths and English. We go hillwalking as well as the alternative therapies. I come here in the morning and am here all day."

"I was a late starter with drugs, " says Joe. "I didn't start smoking hash until I was 17 and didn't take heroin until I was 23. The funny thing is that I used to be really anti-heroin. I went on the wrong road when I was younger for a number of different reasons.

"I was only on heroin for a year, and so was my partner, but we ended up homeless for a while.

Then she died a couple of years back and we have a few kids. I think people expected me to go off the rails after that but it made me get help for the sake of my kids.

"I'm in my early 30s and the help I've gotten here has given me hope for the future for the first time. I love the stability of having something to do every day and somewhere to go. This place is invaluable. I've done parenting courses here and my kids attend the child psychologist. I've done a community addiction course here and hope to become a drug counsellor. It's hard for someone who hasn't been addicted to understand."