From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishface up to something phrasal verbDEAL WITHto accept and deal with a difficult fact or problem They’ll never offer you another job; you might as well face up to it. She had to face up to the fact that he was guilty. → face→ See Verb table
Examples from the Corpus
face up to • Mr Toledo, the presidential favourite, has had to face up to his own video scandal.• I think we ought to face up to it.face up to it• I think we ought to face up to it.• It took time until she could face up to it. 