Software Update and Battery Life

Yesterday my laptop's battery life was at 63% and charging just fine. Yesterday evening I updated the software to Monterey 12.6.3. Today, the battery life is 36% and my laptop will not charge at all. So many posts claim that software updates do not harm battery life at all, but come on. I'm running a 2017 Macbook Air that has worked with no issues whatsoever, now it is nearly unusable. What is there to do other than shelling out $1,000 for a new one?