Originally Posted by
allthatsgood 
Someone asked me today if my addicted son had low self esteem before he got into drugs. They seemed to be making the case that there was a connection. I never really thought about that and was wondering what others think.
According to Dr Gabor Mate
(Doctors Advice from the Stickys at the top of the forum)
He shares these views:
“Both addiction and ADD are rooted in childhood loss and trauma.”
In his book, “In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts” he focuses mostly on the pain behind the addiction. He believes your “Fighting not the substance but the circumstances that lead someone to seek out that self-soothing.”
“Addiction is nothing more than an attempt to self-medicate emotional pain”.
The Hungry Ghosts represented in his book are “starving for external satisfaction, seeking to fill but never being full, desperate to be soothed”. This is why his emphasis is more on Kind Love IMO.
So I would say Yes, it would be common for someone to suffer low self esteem prior to beginning drug use, and then IMO the drugs alter their personality so what you see on the outside is not necessarily what is true on the inside. Quite often why a person needs psychiatric help to unravel what's at the root of addiction in order to find long term recovery.