'Effective Power' bug. iMessage crashing

A friend sent me the new trend. The effective power text that restarts your iPod, iPhone, even iPad. This is where my problem started. Every time I try to open iMessage, it crashes within seconds. I'm not sure how to fix this problem, and every time I try to research ways to fix it, they fail. I have even tried backing up my iPad, restoring its default settings, and then loading the backed up content onto my device. Still nothing! Any advice on how to fix this?