diff --git a/mwparserfromhell/parser/tokenizer.c b/mwparserfromhell/parser/tokenizer.c
index 88ca3f2..8dace5a 100644
--- a/mwparserfromhell/parser/tokenizer.c
+++ b/mwparserfromhell/parser/tokenizer.c
@@ -835,11 +835,7 @@ static int Tokenizer_parse_heading(Tokenizer* self)
         self->global ^= GL_HEADING;
         return 0;
     }
-#ifdef IS_PY3K
-    level = PyLong_FromSsize_t(heading->level);
-#else
-    level = PyInt_FromSsize_t(heading->level);
-#endif
+    level = NEW_INT_FUNC(heading->level);
     if (!level) {
         Py_DECREF(heading->title);
         free(heading);
@@ -2279,7 +2275,11 @@ static PyObject* Tokenizer_tokenize(Tokenizer* self, PyObject* args)
 {
     PyObject *text, *temp;
 
-    if (!PyArg_ParseTuple(args, "U", &text)) {
+    if (PyArg_ParseTuple(args, "U", &text)) {
+        Py_XDECREF(self->text);
+        self->text = PySequence_Fast(text, "expected a sequence");
+    }
+    else {
         const char* encoded;
         Py_ssize_t size;
         /* Failed to parse a Unicode object; try a string instead. */
@@ -2294,10 +2294,6 @@ static PyObject* Tokenizer_tokenize(Tokenizer* self, PyObject* args)
         Py_XDECREF(temp);
         self->text = text;
     }
-    else {
-        Py_XDECREF(self->text);
-        self->text = PySequence_Fast(text, "expected a sequence");
-    }
     self->head = self->global = self->depth = self->cycles = 0;
     self->length = PyList_GET_SIZE(self->text);
     return Tokenizer_parse(self, 0, 1);
diff --git a/mwparserfromhell/parser/tokenizer.h b/mwparserfromhell/parser/tokenizer.h
index 1229688..264360e 100644
--- a/mwparserfromhell/parser/tokenizer.h
+++ b/mwparserfromhell/parser/tokenizer.h
@@ -255,12 +255,14 @@ static PyObject* Tokenizer_tokenize(Tokenizer*, PyObject*);
 /* Macros for Python 2/3 compatibility: */
 
 #ifdef IS_PY3K
+    #define NEW_INT_FUNC      PyLong_FromSsize_t
     #define IMPORT_NAME_FUNC  PyUnicode_FromString
     #define CREATE_MODULE     PyModule_Create(&module_def);
     #define ENTITYDEFS_MODULE "html.entities"
     #define INIT_FUNC_NAME    PyInit__tokenizer
     #define INIT_ERROR        return NULL
 #else
+    #define NEW_INT_FUNC      PyInt_FromSsize_t
     #define IMPORT_NAME_FUNC  PyBytes_FromString
     #define CREATE_MODULE     Py_InitModule("_tokenizer", NULL);
     #define ENTITYDEFS_MODULE "htmlentitydefs"