General aviation pilot reported receiving a low altitude warning from ATC while intercepting the initial approach in IMC weather; resulting in an unusual attitude on the missed approach. The pilot recovered and returned to land.

Narrative

I filed an IFR flight plan from ZZZ to FTY. Upon arrival into the Atlanta area; the weather was worse than forecasted; entering IMC upon initial descent from 8;000 ft and being 500 ft above ground level at FTY. Other area airports were below minimums and traffic was being re-routed to FTY. The controllers were doing a good job of handling all the traffic; but were requesting everyone to keep their speed up; etc. I was cleared for the ILS08; which I programmed into my GPS. Starting on a westbound course; I was given two left-hand turns to line up with Runway 08 and asked to keep my speed up. The glide slope indicator on the GPS came on; so I lowered my gear and began to descend. Shortly thereafter; tower came on the frequency and gave me a low altitude warning. I immediately climbed. The GPS was still telling me to descend and I got another low altitude warning from the tower. At this point; I decided to execute the missed approach. My normal standard operating procedure when I am copying a clearance or programming my avionics is to flip on the autopilot first. Unfortunately; I got very focused on trying to figure out why my GPS was not working properly and began to troubleshoot the GPS without first turning on the autopilot while still in IMC. Without realizing it; I got into an unusual attitude while in IMC which I noticed simultaneously with Atlanta approach calling me on the radio to warn me about it. This situation was very concerning. Fortunately; my training kicked in and I leveled the wings; achieved a flat and level attitude; and added full power to climb. Atlanta approach asked me to do the ILS08 again. I requested the RNAV08 because I was not positive that my GPS was going to work properly for the ILS08. The GPS worked flawlessly for the RNAV08 and the approach was flown properly. I have already called my instructor and ask him to provide some additional training to me because of this situation. I have already called the avionics shop and asked to bring the plane in to have the GPS checked. In terms of lessons learned: Pilots should have a means of cross-checking the information that comes out of any one piece of equipment. I was very focused on the illumination of the glide slope icon and lowered the gear and commenced the descent immediately. Pilots should have a means of double checking this; cross referencing the chart or programming the same approach into the second GPS. The synthetic vision that was available on my IPad would have helped with this as well. Pilots should execute the missed approach immediately upon the first sign of a glide slope problem. Pilots should not underestimate how concerning a situation like this is and how that level of concern can affect their future performance in flying the rest of the flight. Pilots who have an autopilot available; as I did; should always turn the autopilot on before attempting to do anything else such as troubleshooting a GPS. Fortunately; I do IPCs (Instrument Proficiency Check) annually and also recently completed a Pilot Proficiency Program; which included an additional IPC (Instrument Proficiency Check). I am very grateful that I had a lot of recent training in unusual attitudes under the hood; as that enabled me to recover from a very dangerous situation. Pilots should seek additional training such as this above and beyond the requirements for their level of their license; as I am only a private pilot. An unusual attitude in IMC is another event that had a large impact on me and likely will have a large impact on other pilots. Pilots should be aware that; even after the recovery; it can affect pilot performance during the balance of the flight. My goal for the additional training is to develop better aeronautical decision making skills which will prevent me from being in such a dangerous situation in the future. I am certainly still going to practice unusual attitudes under the hood even more; but it is a skill I hope to never need again.