No, artificial tears do not cause floaters. Artificial tears go on the surface of the eye and floaters are inside the eye usually in the vitreous cavity near the back of the eye. Floaters are caused by either condensation of the vitreous gel, tissue, or cells floating in the vitreous cavity. New floaters in the eye are often benign but they can signal other problems in the eye like inflammation or even a retinal detachment. I would recommend going to see an eye doctor and getting a dilated eye exam hopefully within a week and if you notice any part of your vision missing or that your vision has blurred that you see an eye doctor immediately.
I think your doctor is trying to ensure the safety of your eyes which is the highest priority and is to be commended. I generally do not recommend going against your doctors orders. I can say that with my patients I do not recommend weight lifting for at least one week after Lasik and when they do resume they need to be careful not to rub or bump their eyes. Getting sweat into your eyes can result in you rubbing your eyes before you think about it and in so doing you could dislodge your flap causing serious problems and vision loss. So I certainly cannot fault your surgeon for being cautious.
The short answer is, it depends. It depends on how strong your prescription is, whether you are nearsighted or farsighted, how regularly shaped your cornea is, your family history of corneal anomalies, and how much risk you are willing to take. Assuming that you are nearsighted, when we perform your LASIK surgery we remove tissue in the center of the cornea in order to correct your prescription. We also create a flap which effectively thins the cornea more. If we thin the cornea to much the concern is that it can bulge similar to if you were to thin one area of a car tire. If the cornea becomes to irregular from the bulging then it could blur your vision even to the point that it may not be completely correctable with contacts or glasses and in a worse case need further surgery including corneal transplantation. An alternative to LASIK which effectively thins the cornea less is PRK (Photorefractive Keratectomy). Your surgeon may discuss PRK or another alternative to LASIK in your situation.
The most important question is how is your vision in your eyes? If it is good then you probably did not cause serious damage. If however your vision is poor or worse then you need to see your surgeon asap. If the vision is good, tearing is improving and you don't have any pain or thick yellow or green discharge then you may be ok to watch it for two days to see if it resolves on it's own. If otherwise then you need to call and see your surgeon.
It is very uncommon to to cause large wrinkles in your flap more than two weeks after Lasik but not impossible. If you aggressively rubbed or bumped your eye you could certainly could still wrinkle the flap. After more than a couple months it usually takes trauma to the eye to dislodge or create large wrinkles in the flap.
