imessage: "Unable to verify email because it is already in use"

To prevent accidentlly selecting a FaceTime chat at a bad hour while looking at the logs and calling a friend in the middle of the night, I went into the settings one night and turned FaceTime "off". Curious as to if it would let me stay signed in, I immediately turned it back "on". It wasn't signed in.

It asked for my AppleID password so I put that in but it kept trying to verify it with a loading symbol. Thinking that the password was the problem, I went into iforgot and changed the password by adding a few numbers to the end. Now because the password for the AppleID was changed, as soon as I went back into the settings, not only would it not let me log into FaceTime, but Messages as well.

For the "activation" of these apps (though they've already been active for many months; I've been using them since December 2011 with no problems) it accepts my AppleID and password but when it asks me "People will message/FaceTime you using your email address. What would you like to use?", I select the email I've always used for these (and I confirmed with a friend that this was the email she had messaged me at before) it told me "Unable to verify email because it is already in use." (Yes. It's in use. By ME. How do I sign back in to my own account?)

Thinking that the iPod was being frustrating because it wasn't updated, I updated itunes and the iPod and then restored it (and I also did something wrong here - not all of the data was put back onto the iPod). This didn't solve the problem.

My goal here is to be able to sign into iMessage and FaceTime using the email I'd used for them before so I'll be able to look at past messages with friends and FaceTime logs. I could easily connect these with a new email account but I'm intent on finding a way to recover the old messages associated with my email (which is the same as my AppleID, as it always has been.)

My goal: to sign back into iMessage using the email that's already in use, becuase its MY account in iMessage, and I should be able to log into it.

Any help is greatly appreciated! Thanks!