diff --git a/ReactAndroid/src/main/java/com/facebook/react/fabric/mounting/MountingManager.java b/ReactAndroid/src/main/java/com/facebook/react/fabric/mounting/MountingManager.java
index 7d89e34ebf7..e48192e8963 100644
--- a/ReactAndroid/src/main/java/com/facebook/react/fabric/mounting/MountingManager.java
+++ b/ReactAndroid/src/main/java/com/facebook/react/fabric/mounting/MountingManager.java
@@ -244,18 +244,36 @@ public class MountingManager {
 
     ViewGroupManager<ViewGroup> viewGroupManager = getViewGroupManager(viewState);
 
-    if (viewGroupManager.getChildCount(parentView) <= index) {
+    try {
+      viewGroupManager.removeViewAt(parentView, index);
+    } catch (RuntimeException e) {
+      // Note: `getChildCount` may not always be accurate!
+      // We don't currently have a good explanation other than, in situations where you
+      // would empirically expect to see childCount > 0, the childCount is reported as 0.
+      // This is likely due to a ViewManager overriding getChildCount or some other methods
+      // in a way that is strictly incorrect, but potentially only visible here.
+      // The failure mode is actually that in `removeViewAt`, a NullPointerException is
+      // thrown when we try to perform an operation on a View that doesn't exist, and
+      // is therefore null.
+      // We try to add some extra diagnostics here, but we always try to remove the View
+      // from the hierarchy first because detecting by looking at childCount will not work.
+      //
+      // Note that the lesson here is that `getChildCount` is not /required/ to adhere to
+      // any invariants. If you add 9 children to a parent, the `getChildCount` of the parent
+      // may not be equal to 9. This apparently causes no issues with Android and is common
+      // enough that we shouldn't try to change this invariant, without a lot of thought.
+      int childCount = viewGroupManager.getChildCount(parentView);
+
       throw new IllegalStateException(
           "Cannot remove child at index "
               + index
               + " from parent ViewGroup ["
               + parentView.getId()
               + "], only "
-              + parentView.getChildCount()
-              + " children in parent");
+              + childCount
+              + " children in parent. Warning: childCount may be incorrect!",
+          e);
     }
-
-    viewGroupManager.removeViewAt(parentView, index);
   }
 
   @UiThread